


Room 23

by orphan_account



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Music, Bottom Levi (Shingeki no Kyojin), F/F, F/M, Fluff, Light Dom/sub, M/M, Mental Health Issues, Multi, POV Multiple, mostly Levi though
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-10-20
Updated: 2014-05-05
Packaged: 2017-12-29 23:17:34
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 14
Words: 63,520
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1011259
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Levi channels his emotions into painting, college student by day and barista by night. He has clear goals and is on his way to accomplish them, but he's finding that the further in life he goes, the less he seems to know.</p>
<p>Eren Yeager pours everything into his music, stumbling face-first into Levi's life when he starts playing at the local coffee shop where Levi works. Levi can't put his finger on it, but Eren gets under his skin in a way that no one else has.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Julia With Blue Jeans On

**Author's Note:**

> I haven't worked on a fic since uh, 2007, which was a long time ago.
> 
> I wanted to write from Eren's point of view, but the scenes I put together in my head were in Levi's perspective and I've already played him in a pretty long RP, so he feels more natural.
> 
> I'll spare you the self-deprecating comments I want to type here, um, enjoy! Yeah.

_Gonna need you to come in tonight!_

I glared at the text on my phone, as though by sheer power of will alone I could force Hanji to take back what she had sent me. Tuesdays off weren't a thing I was really accustomed to, but I had been looking forward to uncorking a bottle of wine and painting to my heart's content until I passed out. No class on Wednesday was a beautiful thing.

Of course, Hanji would have to ruin that. Of course I would have to spend my night knee-deep in coffee and baked goods and fucking _talent_ _night_.

Let me back up: Tuesday nights were always shitty. Working in a coffee shop, or customer service of any kind, is unarguably shitty. Somehow, working at Room 23 was even more grating than it had to be. I actually have an entire list of reasons why:

  1. Room 23, being a local coffee fixture, stuck out like a sore thumb in the sea that is Starbucks. Anyone wanting to look cool while still getting their coffee on wandered into the shop in droves.

  2. People are bad enough, but people whose ability to even tie their own shoes I often questioned, always came in with the same order: “like, a frappuccino?” We don't _make_ frappuccinos. We don't make frappuccinos, we're never going to make frappuccinos, and you've never had a frappuccino from here no matter how many times you insist you have. I've written it on the chalkboard half a dozen times, but apparently that's “poor customer service.”

  3. College kids filtered in and out nonstop, using the shop as a place to do homework in peace (and, in turn, wrecking said peace) every night. The feverish gleams in their eyes as they scanned their text books in varying states of panic were amusing, sure, but when it bubbled over into giant meltdowns I tended to lose my patience.

  4. Tuesdays were shitty in general for the average 18-24 crowd that wanted something interesting out of their nights, and somehow that added up to “go to a coffee shop.”

  5. Under new management, Room 23 had become host to local talent on Tuesday nights to try to make the atmosphere more interesting.




That's only half the list, but the gist is there. Making lists of things that are going to put me in an early grave is probably strange, and I accept that. But, where some people have Jack Daniels, I have lists.

I don't have anything against being a barista in particular, not any more than I have anything against brushing my teeth or doing laundry. It's more that between uninspired beat poetry and douches with acoustic guitars, I was pretty sick of talent night. Maybe it was unfair to expect the people on our makeshift stage to have an ounce of talent, or at least something interesting to say, but the word talent usually implied capability.

My last class of the day was something something contemporary art, one of the last requirements I had left before I could graduate and be free of BU. It ran until 5:30, giving me only half an hour to get myself to work. I'd set up shop in Cambridge, not because I was _pining_ , but there was something comfortable about being surrounded by people my own age, trying to do their own thing.

I could have gone to Harvard if I had wanted to. I'm not just saying that to make myself feel better, because I _am_ going to Harvard, just not yet. The idea of racking up a lifetime of crippling debt before even setting foot in grad school didn't sit well with me, funnily enough. BU seemed like a safe choice.

When I came in the side door behind the shop counter, someone had already set up a keyboard, mic, and single stool on the stage. I inwardly cursed Hanji, heading to the back room to punch in and grab my apron. I both loved and hated the thing. It was an ugly shade of green, of course, because nothing says coffee quite like a green apron. Ugly or not, it did protect my clothes from the hazards of working in a coffee-shop-slash-bakery. I could always appreciate things that kept me clean.

“Hey Levi!”

Petra's voice greeted me in the back room, simultaneously chipper and tired. Her hair was pulled back in a ponytail too short to be possible, loose strawberry blonde locks framing her face.

“Eh.” I replied with a shrug, pinning my name tag on my apron. At some point, Hanji (I couldn't really consider an immature twenty-something my boss) had scribbled over my name and written 'cockbite' in block letters. She had dissolved into a fit of laughter when I stared at the black pin blankly, but her punishment for being completely asinine had been fun while it had lasted, even if it didn't last long.

You couldn't really let customers read a name tag that said 'cockbite.'

“Yeah, I know what you mean.” Petra rolled her eyes at me as she walked by me to return to the counter. I followed her, slowly. I wanted to delay the moment when I would have to explain to some kid who loved sugar and milk but not coffee that yes, a mocha _is_ supposed to taste that much like coffee.

“Hanji in today?” I asked, scanning the small crowd that had gathered in the shop in the time I had been putting on my apron.

“God, I hope so. The guy playing here tonight is pretty popular, according to Christa. We're gonna be slammed.” Petra fiddled with tightening her apron straps as she spoke, her gaze fixed on nothing in particular. Ymir was already on the register, while Christa was making drinks. The two girls had an odd dynamic that I hadn't quite figured out, and they weren't telling. Hanji was running a bet on whether or not they were dating or just friends, much to my dismay. Wagering money on the relationships of my coworkers had never been appealing to me, and I had reminded Hanji on a few occasions that she was brewing an HR shitstorm.

She just cackled her idiotic cackle.

“Popular guy,” I repeated, picking up one of the cups that Ymir had written an order on and getting to work with the arduous task of pouring a black coffee. “What's he doing in a shitty coffee shop? Last time I checked, Cambridge wasn't exactly a thriving music scene.”

“He's doing a solo act.” Christa chimed in, smiling at me as I handed off the coffee to someone who I was fairly sure was already overly caffeinated. He could possibly answer my theory that drinking enough coffee could cause someone to literally explode from violent jittering. I kept my eye on him as he took a seat.

“How'd you know that?” Petra asked as she pulled a croissant out of the pastry case to heat up. The beep of the microwave toaster _thing_ grated on my nerves as she punched in numbers. It beeped at her loudly, and she sighed an started punching in numbers again. I was going to go Office Space on that thing some day.

“Have you ever heard of The 104th? They play shows around here a lot,” Christa grinned over at Ymir. “That's how I met Ymir. She's a groupie.”

“I'm not a groupie,” Ymir scoffed. “The 104th sucks.” The customer handing over her debit card looked affronted. “I liked them better before Annie pulled a Yoko Ono.”

“What the everliving fuck are you talking about?” I asked. Ymir shrugged in response.

“I don't think the 104th qualifies for Beatles status.” Christa smiled sweetly at Ymir, who I had learned long ago couldn't avoid acting like an idiot when Christa was involved. She scratched the back of her head, a red flush on her cheeks as she avoided Christa's gaze. I was pretty proud of myself for not laughing at the display.

Our banter died down as the line of people ordering drinks grew, our talk turning into a cycle of coffee lingo that lasted well into the beginning of the performance. The soft piano that was now filling the small shop wasn't exactly awful to listen to, a fact I appreciated as the week previous Hanji had hosted a karaoke night. My disdain for karaoke had been solidified that night, as I was forced to suffer through Thrift Shop at least 10 times.

“Mikasa!” I called out as I sprinkled cinnamon on top of a mountain of latte foam and whipped cream. A girl approached the counter, reaching out a delicate hand to take the steaming latte. Her slanted gray eyes were stoic, an expression I knew all too well, her lips nearly a flat line on her face. I was somewhat impressed.

“Eyy, Mikasa es su casa!” someone called from the door as he trudged inside, a shiteating grin plastered on his weirdly long face. He was followed by a guy whose freckles I could see from 20 feet away, but the eye patch he wore was a little more obtrusive.

“Bet you get that a lot.” I quipped as Mikasa thanked me for her coffee. She looked a little surprised, but humored me with a soft smile. Her free hand tangled absently in a red scarf that looked well worn in as she replied.

“You have no idea.”

“Bet I do.” I gestured to my name tag.

“Oh, that's rough.” An awkward pause. “Thanks for the coffee.”

“Yup.”

The shop hit a lull. The crowd seated around the small cafe tables seemed enraptured by the “popular guy” on the stage before them. I used the time to grab a rag and wipe milk and syrup from the counter while Petra gave the floor a quick sweep. The music I was trying to tune out assaulted me in the quiet, lyrics only just discernible over the haunting piano. I could be snobby with my music tastes; Petra had learned this the hard way in her first couple of days at the shop, having put one of her own playlists on the speakers. I lasted maybe 20 seconds into Ke$ha before I gave her “the talk” while Hanji giggled silently at the register.

Whatever this kid was playing, though, it was nice. Emotive.

 

_But I have a way of bleeding dry_

_Anything you call a rose_

_From red to white_

_A full bouquet_

_To fucking snow_

 

“Sounds tragic.” Ymir remarked sarcastically. She was leaning against the counter, looking unconcerned with the fact that everyone was cleaning up but her. I shot her a glare that she returned without hesitation. Fair enough, as she would probably be the one stuck mopping the entire store later. Hanji was weirdly particular about how the floors looked, which is a complete fucking mystery to me. Her apartment had been in need of at least one decent clean since I had met her.

“Yeah, this song is pretty deep.” Christa nodded at Ymir, either ignoring or not sensing the sarcasm. She paused in setting washed mugs on the drying rack, gazing up at the stage. “No wonder he's doing solo stuff, this is nothing like the band.”

“Hey, can I get a pour over?” a voice spoke from the register, coming from a kid with a mop of blond hair; I would have sworn he was a girl had I not heard him speak.

“Sure!” Christa went to the register, ringing up his order. “Levi, you wanna do the honors?”

I busied myself taking a teapot that held scalding water from the warmer. I poured it through a dripper into a freshly washed mug, discarded the water, and then pushed the filter into place. I found myself struck suddenly by an abrupt change in the piano's melody, the emotions poured into a simple line.

 

_It's a mad man's game_

 

I added a dash of cream and sugar to the mug as a familiar feeling crept into the pit of my stomach in the way only music could cause. Music and painting go hand in hand for me; most of my inspiration for my work came from the music I listened to, the tone and lyrics of a song throwing images into my mind that my hands itched to place on canvas.

I had a brief vision of a person, or the silhouette of a person, perched in a small window in a cramped apartment room. Smoke furled from their mouth, a burning cigarette in one hand as they looked moodily over the bright lights of a skyline that I was sure my mind had conjured itself. The scene was dark, splashed with deep gray and black, the only color coming from t he various lights shining in the background. I regretted that I hadn't brought along a sketch pad.

 

_I had been spending a lot of time_

_In my expensive furs_

_When the question first occurred to me_

 

Petra cleared her throat, bringing me out of my reverie. I mumbled an apology. For some reason I was the only one in the shop that could make a half-way decent pour over, a fact that made little sense owing to the fact that pouring hot water over some coffee grounds wasn't on my list of complicated tasks.

Aside from the music, the shop was eerily quiet as I put the dripper in place on top of the mug. I looked up, curious at what was so interesting that no one was even whispering. All eyes were fixed on the stage, though that wasn't exactly unexpected. I flicked my gaze to the stage as well, dimly lit by the “ambient” lighting the shop boasted on its website. It cast a strange glow on the man sitting at the keyboard, his fingers working over the keys gracefully. He gazed at his hands, clearly deep in concentration.

I didn't blame him. As I've already said, I find it hard to believe that some people can tie their own shoes, and playing piano while singing seemed difficult enough to me.

The singer looked up, mussed brown hair falling in his eyes as he scanned the room. I caught the briefest glimpse of startling teal under the lights as our gazes met momentarily.

 

_Is there_

_Anything more famous_

_Anything more grand_

_Anything more noble than a folded hand?_

 

He had already looked away, back at his hands, and I was dimply aware of warmth spilling over my fingers before I tried to jerk my hand away from the coffee mug I was holding. It fell to the floor with a shatter; the music seemed to skip like a CD, people craning their necks to look behind the counter before returning their attention to the stage.

“Merde!” I cursed under my breath, feeling my hand go rigid. It had already turned an angry, splotchy red, and Jesus fucking Christ did it hurt.

Petra grabbed me and steered me to the sink before I registered what had happened, jerking my hand under cool water. I hissed at the contact. Christa was apologizing behind me, the sound of china being swept up barely audible over the music.

 

_Fantasy_

_It's a mad man's game_

 

I let out a string of curses, forcing my hand to remain in the water. At least it had stopped burning. I could see blisters already forming on the soft curve from the base of my thumb to my index finger. Right on my fucking _painting hand_ , because why not?

Ymir was giving me a look, one that clearly read “what the fucking fuck you fucking imbecile.” Or maybe I'm just projecting what I would have said if our roles had been reversed.

“Well, at least we don't need to take you to the hospital.” Petra said, her cheerfulness obviously forced. I didn't blame her. My hand looked awful.

“Gross.” I muttered disdainfully.

 

_Now I'd say the only word worth singing_

_Is a name_

_And I'd say the only name worth singing_

_Is not... God_

_It's you, Julia_

_As beautiful and simple as the sun_

 

I turned my head to the stage again, not really wanting to watch my skin evolve from it's normal pale hue to angry, “fuck you” red mess. I was even less interested in blisters, which had always made me feel a little ill for some reason.

No, scratch that. Not for “some reason.” Fucking pus.

I met a curious teal glance for the second time, and I'd be lying if I didn't say the combination of his face and the intensity of the lyrics wasn't on the verge of sending chills down my spine.

 

_I see you there_

_Oh, at the bottom of the stairs_

_Obliterating everything I've ever written down_

 

God, that voice. It was a touch raspy, a touch hesitant, but it worked for the song. I listened to the last few lyrics, the passion so thick in his voice I wondered who it was that had caused this song. Love songs were usually trite. The emotions were more complex than to just categorize it as a “love song,” but I realized with fascination that the meaning behind his lyrics was just out of my grasp.

 

_Was there any other way_

_That you could have been found?_

_Oh Julia, with blue jeans on_

 

The water turning off dragged me back into reality, as did the fresh wave of pain at the loss of contact. Christa was making a new pour over, apologizing still to the blond kid, who looked like he'd rather just shrink back into the crowd than keep standing at the counter. Petra was biting her lip as she examined my hand, but she just gave me a half-shrug.

“Damnit, Levi, I'm a barista, not a doctor.” she offered, causing Christa and Ymir to snort with laughter.

“Har, har. Thanks anyway.” I laid the sarcasm on thick.

“What happened, Levi?” the mocking tone to Ymir's voice was obvious, but I ignored it.

“He was looking at the stage.” Christa grinned mischievously, and I made a mental note to slip a spider in her apron or something. Ymir gave her a knowing glance.

Make that several spiders.

“Yeah,” I tossed my head to flip my bangs out of my face. They fell resolutely back in place across my forehead, as though determining that my side part just wasn't good enough. “I was just in shock that Hanji found someone with actual talent to play in this shitty coffee shop.”

“We said he was in a band.” Ymir replied, as though that actually explained anything. Plenty of people were in bands, and plenty of those bands were fucking awful.

“A band that sucks.” I reminded her.

“Well, yeah.” she waved a hand absently, turning back to the register as a handful of people got up between songs to grab a drink.

I flexed my hand in front of my face with a frown. I probably deserved Ymir's ire, as I am at least self-aware enough to know that I have a salty personality that doesn't work well with others. It's not like I try to be an asshole, but my lack of patience for people tended to get ahead of my good sense to just shut up.

By the time the shop closed, Hanji still hadn't shown. I had a feeling that she hadn't scheduled herself for the evening, but I was still irritated that I couldn't leave and nurse my hand. I was basically useless for most of the cleaning, but Ymir was efficient. The floor had been mopped, chairs placed on tables, machines turned off and sanitized before the night's entertainment shuffled back through the side door to check he had grabbed everything. I watched him, daring him with a glare to track mud, but he paid me no attention. Satisfied that he hadn't left anything on the stage, he sauntered up to the counter. “You got any coffee left?” his voice sounded younger than I expected, and up close he looked a little awkward.

“Nope.” I replied with the icy tone I reserved for strangers (sometimes friends), too irritated to feel charitable. Like hell I was going to make another pour over.

“Hey Eren!” Christa came out of the back room, her hair down and apron removed. Ymir trailed behind her, hands in the front pockets of her hoodie and looking as disinterested in her surroundings as ever.

“Christa!” Eren greeted, giving her a little high five. I fought not to roll my eyes.

“You need something? I can make you a drink if you want.” Christa said cheerfully, already halfway behind the counter when Eren held up his hand, shaking his head.

“Nah, you guys are closed,” I appreciated his observation more than I thought I would. “I'll just make some when I get home.”

I watched the three stop to chat, noticing that this Eren was extremely boyish. He couldn't be a day over 20, but his eyes held a strange sort of wisdom that seemed beyond the rest of us. He smiled easily and laughed often during the conversation, but I couldn't help feeling the distinct discomfort that radiated off of him. I almost couldn't believe Ymir and Christa didn't notice.

“I'm locking up!” Petra announced. She closed the door to the break room, locked it, and headed for the side door. “You guys don't have to go home, but you can't stay here.”

I groaned. “Petra, your pop culture references need work.” Eren laughed at that, following Ymir and Christa to the side door.

“As if you know anything about _pop culture_.” Petra retorted haughtily. I paused to think, then shrugged. She was right. As far as I knew, Lady Gaga was still the most popular singer ever.

We said our goodbyes as we all exited into the breezy night. The temperature had fallen after the sun had disappeared beyond the horizon, a brief preview of the turbulent winter that awaited us in the next few months. I pulled my jacket closed, shivering, when I realized Eren was going in the same direction I was. I slowed my walk, turning to look over my shoulder at him. The surprised reaction when I glared at him told me I must have looked sour. “My car is over here.” was all Eren said, holding up his hands.

“Tch,” I narrowed my eyes, but turned and kept walking. “Did I even ask?”

A soft chuckle was not the reaction I expected, but I didn't acknowledge it. Our footsteps seemed heavy in the stillness night had brought on, echoing off the buildings as we made our way to our cars. I pulled out my keys and pressed the unlock, a cheerful _beep beep!_ sounding as the headlights flashed. Grumpily, I noticed that I could already see my breath misting in the air. Boston wasn't as bad as Montreal, but it wasn't much better.

“Hey,” Eren called as I went to open my car door. I turned around, hand still on the handle, one eyebrow quirked in puzzlement. “I didn't catch your name.”

“No shit, I didn't tell you.” I replied bluntly, but he didn't seem put off. I would have to try harder, I decided.

“You could tell me now. I'm Eren.” he grinned at me, unlocking his car with his keys. He drove a beat up Honda that looked pathetic next to my Miata. I'm not usually one for self-indulgence, but I felt an acceptance letter from Harvard warranted me buying myself a gift. It helped that the monthly payments were low.

“Okay.” I replied, adding a little questioning inflection in hopes he would realize that I didn't really care.

“Fair enough,” Eren took it in stride, his grin plastered to his face as he put one foot in his car. “See you next week!” he added brightly, before sliding in the car and closing the door. I stood next to my car, confused, looking at the spot where Eren had just been.

Before I could do so much as tap on his window and ask what the fuck he was talking about, Eren pulled out of his space and then the parking lot. “ _Hanji_.” I grumbled the name, not sure what harebrained scheme she had cooked up, but already knowing that I wouldn't fucking like it.


	2. In This City

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Drinking, painting, Hanji, and introspection. Everything Levi needs to make a night complete.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Lots of thanks to my BFF rapinii.tumblr.com for the awesome headcanons she gave me involving Hanji during our Ereri RP. I would have no idea how to even begin writing Hanji if not for her. She was also kind enough to beta for me, after I got stuck in a neverending rewrite loop.
> 
> Apologies ahead of time to philosophy majors, I have nothing against you, Levi is just a dick.
> 
> Sorry for no Eren, he'll be back sooooon. Had to do some brotp interactions.
> 
> I don't know if I'm always going to include lyrics or lists, but for the time being I like including them. Song is "In This City" by Enon.
> 
> Thanks for reading, I hope this chapter was enjoyable.

As far as apartments in Cambridge went, I got pretty lucky. Rent was covered (barely) by my student loans, though I shuddered to think about what my monthly payments on those would be once I graduated. For the time being, I was able to penny pinch and put most of the money I made in savings, half-kidding myself that I would save up enough to take care of my loans for a year or two while I searched for stable work.

Even on lawyer salary, I knew it would be a few years before I could breathe easily. The cost of living in Cambridge took its toll on the amount of money I had to borrow, and I suspected that someone, somewhere was enthusiastically jerking off at the thought of how much interest I would be handing over.

Finding a place for less than $1500 had been a challenge, one that I wasn't sure I would manage. I was thankful, for the first and last time in my life, to have friends in high places. Connections weren't of any use to me, but money? Well, I found myself needing that, even if I hated the prospect of being a little beggar.

I never had much interest for the people that came over for dinner parties and cigars and patting themselves on the back for being privileged white men, at least not until Erwin had come along. He was older than me by a decade, the son of so-and-so Smith, and just as disillusioned with money and his parentage as I was. We spent long nights together, and more often than not I convinced him to model for me. He was uncomfortable with the idea, never willing to remove more than his shirt, but the powerful muscles of his back held me captive and I swear I could paint his broad shoulders until the end of time and never get bored.

I never asked why he came along with his parents, and he never told. I wondered if it was supposed to be a junior introduction to the life his parents expected him to live.

Erwin went on to become a professor, which I thought was a rather humble position for someone who I thought could take the world by the balls and fuck it sideways. He was kind, but shrewd and careful, able to read the world around him and determine the best course of action for any situation. He was also slightly protective of me, which left me nursing infatuation that felt more like a train wreck than anything else.

I called him one day nearing my 22nd birthday, which must have seemed strange after only keeping in touch via email and text for six years or so. I put aside my pride to ask if he'd be willing to let me stay in his place for a little extra cash. My explanation was that I just needed a place to land on my feet for a bit while I got things together to live on my own, and Erwin didn't press me. I was insistent to the point of being obnoxious about paying him, and swore that I would be out as soon as I could, and that I would make it seem like I wasn't there. He chuckled at my conviction, assuring me that he didn't need a cent and offering to let me stay as long as I liked. He appeared in front of the house I had been crashing at on a blistery winter day, the sky a charcoal gradient and no sun in sight. We moved boxes into the truck he'd pulled up, which I later learned he had rented to help me out. If I’d known he was going to be so thorough, I would have informed him that my belongings fit in few enough boxes to fit in a trunk.

I hadn't lived with my parents for years, having taken as few belongings as I could and run like hell from the life I had never wanted. They never tried to find me, as far as I'm aware. I never knew if it was the fact that I was gay, or the rumors about what I got up to that put them off of it, but I learned not to resent it. I didn’t know what I would have done in their situation.

It wasn't lost on me when I realized I was bound for an Ivy-league school and the kind of profession I had fought against, but we all make compromises. I had inherited my mother's skill in manipulation, and my father's affinity for lies, but that didn't mean I had to live my life with them as my strength. In the same vein, I could also use my intelligence to put me in a place where I wouldn't have to be scrounging the bottom of the barrel; to not take that opportunity seemed tantamount to the tantrum of the spoiled child I had never wanted to be.

I never wound up being able to force what little money I had on Erwin, which made me feel like a fucking leech, but I appreciated the money I had saved up in the end. The guest room I slept in was pristine and always had that fresh laundry smell, but I preferred curling up on the couch in the living room. It smelled like Erwin and sometimes, when I wasn't above acting like a teenage girl with a crush, I wrapped myself in the afghan thrown over the back of the couch and fell asleep with the vague notion that one day he would hold me and I'd be able to outrun my demons with him by my side.

I grew up a lot in the time I spent in the Smith home. It's strange how you can be an adult, yet not really know what that means. My need for security gradually melted away as I realized that really, Erwin and I had little in common. I never worked up the courage to tell him how I'd felt, which I'd regretted until I realized that my feelings for him were more brotherly than anything else. He was handsome, and stable, and everything on paper about him was exactly what I needed in my life, but  _he_  wasn't.

When I moved into my studio at the beginning of my last year of undergrad, Erwin drove with me. We had shared years in the same house, while I worked and studied and saved and painted. Our conversation outside the apartment touched on everything and nothing, and when he brought in the last box and disappeared in his pristine black Mercedes, I felt emptier than I could recall ever feeling in my life. I had lost something important, but I couldn't put my finger on what it was. I curled up on my bed that smelled like fresh laundry, a smell that made me weep.

It wasn't until later that I realized that watching him drive away was the last signal that my transition was over, childhood had officially waved me a polite goodbye at 25 and I had only myself to rely on. I wasn't a stranger to the last one, but the difference in doing it by choice and having no other option weighed heavily on me. I had a feeling Erwin would have held me then, if I had asked him. A small part of me still wanted that.

The space I acquired wasn't large; I had a tiny kitchenette I could barely turn around in, walled off from the rest of the room where I had placed an IKEA couch, coffee table, and workspace. The floors were wood, with exposed brick on the largest wall, and a door that led out to a sun room. The nicest part of the package was the small loft where I was lucky enough to be able to cram my bed, though the ceiling was so low that I couldn't have fit a frame there if I had tried. Ah, well, less money to spend.

To channel the whatever it was that I was feeling, I decided to go against the rules the landlord had laid out and painted a skyline mural with muted colors and a starry black sky. Upon coming around to welcome me to the building, she had stared at the wall in open-mouthed horror. I expected her to fly into a fit of rage immediately, but she only remarked that I was a good painter and she could use it as a selling point.

I could imagine the Craigslist ad: ☆*･゜ﾟ･* CHARMING STUDIO WITH LOFT AVAILABLE NOW QUIRKY MURAL LOOK HERE STUDENTS *･゜ﾟ･*☆

I considered painting over it before I left, but in the end, that would require effort and money.

All of that aside, I had been there for almost three months and found that the solitude when I came home from a night at the coffee shop more welcoming than I could have anticipated. I almost didn’t even miss Erwin.

I unlocked the gate that supposedly protected the little complex from intruders, intent on ordering a pizza before restaurants closed. My plans were to drink, paint, and nibble on some breadsticks before I passed out in the spot that looked most comfortable, wine-drunk and content.

I knew the fucking gate didn't work, and proof was sitting outside my door in the form of Hanji, ruiner of days. I glared at her as I approached, noting that she was dressed in a nicer pair of jeans and a button down that wasn't buttoned evenly; her hair was in disarray around her face but, obviously had been tamed with a brush. Before I could ask her what was up, she gestured at a box that I hadn't noticed was sitting by her side.

“Hanji, Hanji, a woman after my own heart.” I greeted her, bending to pick up a case of premixed sangria. I unlocked the door with one hand, going to set the case on my workspace table. Hanji was oddly quiet, sauntering in after me and closing the door with a quiet click of the handle.

“Seemed like a good night for it.” Hanji grinned and flopped down on my couch, kicking her feet up on my coffee table and beckoning me over. I knew she wanted me to bring the wine, just as I knew  _she_  knew I hated people putting their dirty feet on my furniture.

“Make yourself useful and order some pizza.” I replied, taking two bottles out of the case and sitting down next to her while she tapped away on her phone.

“No meat, no pineapple?”

I grunted in response, already taking long swigs of wine and melting back into the couch cushions. I felt the stress seep out of my muscles and sighed contentedly. Step one complete.

“What are you doing here?” I asked Hanji bluntly when she tossed her phone between us on the empty cushion. She was long used to my rude manner and didn't bother acting offended.

“Felt like company without having to deal with the company part.” Hanji replied cryptically. My hunch that something was off intensified, but I wasn't going to spend the night dragging it out of her. I knew she'd talk about whatever nonsense was eating at her when she was ready.

“I appreciate the compliment.” I said dryly, getting up from the couch. In the few moments I had been sitting, I had drank a quarter of the first bottle I would open for myself that night. The shit Hanji brought was weak, but I was sure that 9 bottles between two people would be sufficient.

“You should,” Hanji gave me a wan smile and I suddenly realized how tired she looked. “It was from the heart.”

We both snorted with laughter before she finished the sentence, effectively lightening the mood that Hanji's disposition had been in danger of poisoning.

“Gonna paint.” I told her, taking a sheet of watercolor paper to the kitchen to soak. I didn't have anything in mind yet, realizing with some disappointment that whatever vision had appeared to me back at the coffee shop had long since faded. Such was the curse of not carrying sketchbooks. I was a terrible artist, sometimes.

I took the wet paper to my work station, which was really just a table/bookshelf combo, to begin stapling it to a wooden frame that was already littered with staple holes.

Hanji turned on the TV, flipping channels until she landed on reruns of The Next Generation. I tried to block out whatever drama the Enterprise found itself facing, instead concentrating on laying down paint. The brush strokes soon blossomed into tanned fingers against a piano, colorful flowers growing from the keys into an empty amber expanse. I leaned back to gaze at my work, the paint still bleeding slowly on the wet paper.

“How was the shop tonight?” Hanji asked. I looked over at her, and noticed that she was looking at my painting. She was still sitting on the couch, with an open pizza box on her lap that smelled so strongly of meat I thought I would be ill. I'm not a strict vegetarian, but I have my limits.

“You mean how was  _Eren_?” I asked with a pointed glare that she disregarded in favor of belching loudly. Sometimes I'm not sure how I put up with her. “He brought in a lot of people. He wasn't awful.”

“High praise coming from your insult laden mouth,” Hanji giggled, and I noted that in the time I had spent painting she had opened a second bottle of wine. “I invited him to play every Tuesday, so I'm glad he isn't awful.” Hanji added, like it were an inconsequential detail she had barely remembered.

“What?” I bit the word out irritably, more of a statement than a question. The brief exchange I'd had with Eren in the parking lot suddenly made a lot more sense. It was then that I realized that if the kid with an intense voice and even more intense eyes was going to be playing  _every_  Tuesday, I could say farewell to talent night. I wasn't about to argue with Hanji about that one, and silently thanked the cosmos for aligning in my favor for a change.

“Levi, I was there last week. I  _like_  Macklemore, and I never want to hear another Macklemore song for as long as I live.” Hanji grimaced at the memory, closing the pizza box that was half-empty and pushing it onto the cushion next to her. We sat in silence as I finished my first bottle of wine, looking at the TV without really taking in what we were watching. It was strange to be around Hanji and not have my ear talked off; I was rarely in the mood to chat, always having preferred the listening role (even if I didn't really want to listen). Silence didn't suit us.

With my painting still very much wet and not being in the mood to clear off a space to paint a larger watercolor, my eyes fell on the mural. I had considered it finished, but now that I was looking again I considered that more color wouldn’t hurt. I pulled a bin of mixed acrylics from one of the shelves of my bookshelf and a few long handled brushes. As I mixed some paint on an old, stained palette, Hanji finally spoke. “I was in class. That's why I didn't show.”

I took that in thoughtfully, brushing thin strokes of cyan on the wall to give the impression of light reflecting off water. I gradually blended it into violet, leaning back to squint at it critically. “Class?” I asked when I realized Hanji wasn't going to give out any more details. I kept my back to her, frowning at the neat brush strokes, before attacking the wall with messy fervor. Sometimes careful just didn't work for me. “Since when do you go to class?”

“Since I realized I'm managing people who are as old as I am,” Hanji replied, the mouth of her bottle hovering near her lips. She took a sip, and I heard her pry her mouth away from the bottle with a loud noise like a toilet plunger. I had no idea what was difficult about drinking out of bottles for some people. “You're going to Harvard, Ymir and Christa already have jobs waiting for them with some design company, what am I doing with my life?”

I didn't say anything, because truthfully, I felt like she was right. I had enough foresight to know that it wasn't the best idea to twist the knife, so to speak, so I made a thoughtful noise as I blended oranges and yellows in wavy strokes to imitate the ripple of the water I pictured in my head. The colors faded toward what I guessed I could turn into a bridge. I hadn't planned a bridge, but a bridge would work. “Do you have a plan, then?”

“I'm gonna be the next Neil deGrasse Tyson,” Hanji replied with a giggle. She held her hands up and widened her eyes. “Watch out, we got a badass over here.”

“So, are we talking short-lived internet meme, or astrophysics?” I deadpanned, allowing the corner of my mouth to tilt upwards as Hanji dissolved into laughter at her own antics. I couldn't quite call it a smile, or so I had been informed by Petra, but I tried, dammit.

“Hmm, astrophysics, probably.” Hanji was still laughing, curled over with her knees drawn against her chest and practically  _inviting_  me to yell about keeping her fucking shoes off my couch. I opted to throw a mostly empty paint tube at her, which she caught with surprising dexterity for how drunk she was.

“No shit,” I rolled my eyes despite the fact that she couldn't see my face, layering lighter shades of paint carefully onto the wall. “I'm surprised it took you this long. You've been running that podcast for what, three years now?”

I could practically hear Hanji's eyes light up at the mention of her podcast. She had started it shortly after we met, hatched over a bottle of wine and irritation that I didn't want to listen to her random ideas about our existence, space, time, reality, whatever interested her for the night. I was too old for metaphysics, or at least too tired of philosophy students with more passion for impressing people with their “knowledge” than actual understanding. I respected that Hanji had an interest in something as concrete as a real science.

Hanji had called the podcast  _Naked Science_ , though I had no idea if the name was more to make her ramblings sound interesting or some science inside joke I didn't “get.” Once a month she also hosted Science and Wine, a Q&A session that involved science debates and wine, true to the name. Hanji had insisted that it was homage to the Romans, who had debated ideas once sober and once drunk to verify their solidity.

I knew the rumor she was referring to, and I was pretty sure it was a Reddit “fact” that had actually been about Persians, but I didn't really have the heart to tell her. Hanji was so thorough in the rest of her research that I couldn't take the idea that anyone had debated science in a drunken stupor away from her, especially not when she had such a good time doing so herself.

“I had four hundred listeners on last week's.” Hanji commented as though she were throwing out a comment on the weather. The softness of her voice gave away that she was really trying not to sound excited. I turned to look at her, smiling at the contented expression on her face.

“That's awesome, Hanji. Fucking awesome.” I said, hoping the sincerity in my voice was evident. She looked away from me a little shyly, but I could tell my praise had cheered her up.

The night lightened up after that, whatever weight the prospect of becoming an educated woman had put on Hanji's shoulders vanishing, along with another bottle of wine. I was still a bottle behind her, but my brush strokes were terribly uneven and every fuck up I made was intensely funny to me, so I put down my paint brush and went to check on my watercolor. My thumb came away damp after I pressed the corner, so I flopped on the couch next to Hanji and tried to tune into the Next Generation with her.

“My mom watched this when I was in elementary.” I commented. Hanji made an indistinct noise that could have meant anything.

“My dad went to a con to get Troi's autograph.” she snickered, leaning against me and resting her head on my shoulder. I was just drunk enough to not push her off; I tilted my head to the side to use hers as a headrest instead, yawning widely.

“I think my mom had a crush on Riker. My dad hated Star Trek, though.”

“It's the beard, Levi. Chicks dig the beard.” she made a sound that was something between a hiccup and a belch. I made a disgusted noise and pushed her off, sitting up straight.

“Every time I think you're alright, you have to prove me wrong.” I huffed.

I excused myself to the bathroom, washing my hands and brushing my teeth as thoroughly as I could stand before going back into the living room. Hanji was curled up, resting her head on the throw pillows I had bought as a half-assed attempt at decoration. I grabbed a blanket from the linen closet it and tossed it over her.

I had a brief internal struggle when my eyes fell on my uneaten pizza, but I had already brushed my teeth. I wasn't one to sleep much, so I brewed a pot of coffee (drunk logic, I suppose) and set myself to the task of cleaning up the small mess that Hanji had made in my apartment. For a Hanji mess, it really wasn't bad; there were only a few stray napkins that she had wiped her fingers on, and a packet of red pepper that had fallen on the floor. Thankfully it was closed, because I was not above vacuuming while my guests slept.

Impatient to wait for the piano painting to dry, I sat it on the kitchen counter and rummaged around for a different sized sheet of paper. I went through the same process of wetting it and stapling it to a frame to keep it properly stretched, then looked at the paint I hadn't put away. To give myself time to think, I turned on my old iPod, which I hadn't been able to get rid of due in part to nostalgia, in part to the principle of throwing away $300 electronics.

_I have been listening, such an ancient song_  
 _My eyes are closed but I never sleep_  
 _I felt transparent and saw that lash on your eyes_  
 _You waved me twice on over to my seas_

I blinked at the lyrics, a song I hadn't heard in what felt like years. It wasn't unwelcome though, and I found myself singing along as I mixed phthalo green with ultramarine. The color it produced was a brilliant teal, and though I was too drunk to remember why at the moment, it irritated me.

_We found ourselves none in this city_

_You said our song's cruel, it sounds hissy_

_Brand food is ruling my sanity_

_Scream to your entrance_

_I felt simply in_

The lyrics made no fucking sense to me, but I had stopped giving them attention. Painting is the kind of thing I can get lost in for hours or days at a time, and I was watching pigment pool and spread on the paper with fascination, as though it wasn't my hand causing it.

If I had been more sober I would have sketched out lines first. For the time being, I was satisfied with the first wash that I put down, pale ochre and lightest green. I picked up a colored pencil to stroke in some eyelashes and pencil in the pupil, itching to make the faint green shine brilliantly as the eyes in my memory did.

_Night lights are swayed on_

_I prayed for death_

_Circle and turn around, a closer sky_

God, that song took me back. Not to any specific place or time; I had kept it on one playlist or another since I was younger, having heard it at random at a party and found the nonsense lyrics interesting. It was my first venture outside of the angry metal I typically listened to, the kind of stuff that I would be embarrassed to admit now that I had ever spent money on.

I refocused on my painting, realizing a bit late that the blue-green eyes on the paper were painfully, obviously Eren's. It disoriented me a little, as I hadn't thought I had made enough eye contact with the kid to really pick up on his features, but I could make out his strong brow, the subtle curve of his average nose, and a few strands of brown hair that fell across his forehead. The colors deepened at the edges, bleeding into pure black, lines of heavy pigment dripping down the paper.

“That is so fucking cliché.” I grumbled aloud, glaring at the stereotypical drippy watercolor eye painting that I had seen in every single fucking art related course I had taken. Those eyes had been beautiful, though, and I wondered if Eren would find it weird if I asked him to model sometime. I could probably be a bit more subtle about it than I had been with Erwin. I still felt vague embarrassment over that; I wasn't so much a curious artist as I was a horny 16 year old, but Erwin didn't know that.

Or does he? I asked myself sarcastically, but I couldn't do more than laugh at the thought. It was a 10 year old memory, after all.

I looked up as I heard Hanji muttering in her sleep, before realizing she was mumbling about Bean. Oh, fucking Sawney and Bean. I had stopped going to Hanji's apartment because of those two, which says a lot. I could handle the mess, and the stinky fridge, and the endless piles of “organized chaos” that stretched through Hanji's apartment, but I could not fucking handle snakes. I didn't care how docile they were, I didn't care that they didn’t live feed, I didn’t care that she promised to keep them in their tanks if I came over.

  1. They were snakes.
  2. Oh wait, not just snakes. Pythons. Pythons that could live for 40 years.
  3. Pythons that would be almost as long as I was tall.
  4. For some reason, Hanji liked to let them loose in that disaster of an apartment.
  5. She also named them after a fucking cannibal, seriously Hanji,  _why_?
  6. Snakes carry parasites.
  7. Did I mention they were fucking  _snakes_?



Yeah, there's that list thing again. I can't help it, honestly, just like I can't help finding Hanji's weirdness exceptionally endearing and annoying at the same time.

The sun was rising by the time I felt ready to crash. I stood up from my work bench, still a little wobbly, but mostly sobered thanks in no small part to the liter of water I had drank. I hate hangovers, said everyone who has ever had alcohol.

“Shitty glasses.” I chuckled when I checked on Hanji, pulling her glasses off her face and setting them on the coffee table before she broke them. She was an unusually restless sleeper.

I climbed the ladder to my makeshift bedroom, crawling onto the mattress with a long sigh of pleasure as I felt myself relax and drift off in a nest of down and warmth.


	3. Tel un Seul Homme

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hanji has a bad day, Levi talks to Eren, my brotp gets a little fluff, and things get moving.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The song for this chapter is Tel un Seul Homme by Pierre Lapointe. Thx rapinii.tumblr.com for being my awesome editor.
> 
> I reeeeaaally recommend you check the song out, as it sets the mood really well for the last part. http://youtu.be/DrRCW6omS7M Google really butchers the translation but it will give you the basic gist of what the song is about. Hard to translate etc etc. Sorry. :(
> 
> PS I changed the summary for my fic because I kinda winged it the first time around. I still don't like it but it'll have to do. It's more accurate, anyway.
> 
> PPS I'm ghosts-desu on Tumblr. I post a lot of snk.

Wednesday is the opposite of Tuesday. Where on Tuesday I nearly resort to strangling myself with my apron (well, actually, that was about to change), on Wednesday I get to sleep in. I get to pull the curtain across the window behind my bed, grumble a fuck you to our mother star, and fall back asleep.

Haha, I lied. The last time I slept longer than three hours Jesus was conceived and the world was thrown into the Dark Ages. Why? Because  _miracles_.

I awoke around two hours after my head had hit the pillow. With a groan I rolled onto one side, stretching my arm as I did so. My knuckles collided with the roof, bending my fingers down to press into the fresh burn I had given myself the night previous.

“ _Calisse de tabarnak_!” I hissed, unclenching my hand and glaring at the ceiling.

After a few more gratuitous and completely necessary curses, I scooted down the mattress and climbed down the ladder. I didn’t expect Hanji to still be there, and I was right. For the first time ever, I was sure, she had folded the blanket I gave her (I was proud of her for that no matter how sloppy the job was), and disappeared. I knew she was gone as opposed to say, defiling my bathroom, because of the note that read “come in as soon as you wake up” in her messy scrawl. That was Hanji code for “someone called in and I hate you the most.”

There it was: the one negative thing I could say about no class on Wednesday. Without fail, I was dragged in for the morning rush every single time one of the brats from first shift called in. It happened far too often for my liking, but first shift had a ridiculously high turnover rate due to the whole can’t “party all night and still open at 5AM” thing. What I wouldn’t give to punch one of them.

It wasn't anything personal that I was always the first on the call list; it's just that Hanji is a special kind of heinous bitch and I'm just enough of a sucker to put up with her shit.

I gave a final good stretch, glancing around my apartment. I looked at the mess of paint I’d left on the wall and snorted derisively at my drunken impression of improvement. I could probably salvage it later, decidedly without the three (four? I lost count) bottles of wine that I had consumed.

Speaking of painting…

I looked at my desk to see what I had produced the night before. I definitely remembered painting, just not what the subject of said painting had been. I raised a brow at the green eyes splashed against canvas. I wandered into the kitchen, catching my second Eren-related painting with two raised brows. I grabbed a kitchen knife and carefully cut the now-dry paper from the frame, placing it carefully into my bag between two books so as not to let it wrinkle.

I was impressed with the cleaning I’d managed to do before I had passed out. Everything was put away; I only needed to straighten out my brushes and palettes, and tuck the watercolor paper onto the right shelf. I scanned the couch, satisfied that the pizza boxes weren’t there, before stepping out of the jeans I had fallen asleep in and getting into running shorts and sneakers.

Running was something that I had never really enjoyed. No, that’s not quite right… see, I fucking hate running. It’s awful. There is nothing enjoyable about my feet pounding on the pavement, or the looks other runners give me, or having to dodge a giant mass of fur that is literally too stupid to be taught that you don’t just attack the first thing you see with slobber and muddy paws.

It’s unfortunate that I hate running, because my day never feels quite right without it. I start one step behind everything else and spend the rest of my time trying to make up for the diversions in my usual routine. I would have never figured it all out if I hadn’t been coerced by fucking Erwin to join him on his morning runs, but the feeling of everything sliding off my shoulders into the wind is welcome for someone like me who tends to carry a chip.

I started running to the familiar sound of Grimes, not an artist I cared for, but I liked to have a decent BPM to keep me moving. I’d pulled some shitty playlist off of Huffington Post one morning, frustrated with my inability to name even 10 songs anymore that were decent to work out to. The transition period I was exiting had left me with much mellower tastes than I ever could have believed, coming out of the hurricane that was my early twenties.

Though it probably would have been more prudent to do so, I didn’t check the time before I started my run. Instead, I checked the signs around me; there was no morning traffic, but the sky was still gray and devoid of sunshine. My best guess was that I had managed to sleep until nine. For Hanji's sake, I took the route that would take me by the Charles river; it was the fastest route, and I wanted to take in the view. Especially with that shitty excuse for a river I painted the night before.

It was an hour later when I finally made my way out of my apartment for the second time, freshly showered and Hanji blowing up my phone. My hair was still wet, so I opted to grab my bike off the rack and take off for that windswept, au naturel look. Riding my bike also meant that I could make up for my short run and have a convenient excuse to ignore traffic at my leisure, switching between the road and the sidewalk as needed to keep my pace.

“Nice of you to show up!” Hanji glared at me as I came in the shop. I gazed down at my fingernails to show my disinterest before heading back into the break room to grab my apron. Petra was there with her face down on the table; I wasn’t sure if she was sleeping or quietly praying for death, but decided it would be more polite not to bother her when she was obviously in some form of distress. The morning must have been bad.

“What’d I miss?” I asked Hanji as I came out of the break room.

“Oh, the usual. People wanting coffee, people  _aggressively_  wanting coffee, people aggressively wanting Starbucks coffee, Levi not showing up even though his boss bought him a case of alcohol and pizza.” Hanji waved her hand nonchalantly, but she was smiling.

“Wow, Levi,” I said thoughtfully, making a show of stroking my chin. I’d considered growing a beard for this purpose, but even just stubble made me look like a teenager trying to not get carded. “That guy sounds like a dick.”

“He’s a complete dick, but he makes good coffee. Unfortunately, because I had to suffer the morning short-staffed, he’s also on register duty.”

“Tabarnak.” I grumbled, taking her place and logging into the register. I should have seen it coming when I decided to take a 36 minute run, but Hanji knew how I was. I didn’t manage to say anything else before she wandered into the back room, probably to join Petra or curl into a fetal position or whatever it was they did when they were ready to go home but were only on their first break.

“The secret is to not let your boss sleep over, midget.” Ymir stage-whispered. She was leaning against the counter, openly eating a breakfast croissant she had nicked from the case. A new girl was standing next to her, looking at the espresso machine intently while Christa made a latte.

“The secret is to not work in a shitty coffee shop.” I snapped back, causing new girl — Sasha, according to her nametag — to look up at me in mild surprise.

“Get used to it, newbie.” Ymir said around mouthfuls of ham and egg.

“Can I have a —” Sasha started; her voice was loud and cheerful, but not in the same way as Hanji. Having a possibly sane employee to deal with customers was very appealing. I liked her instantly.

“No.” Ymir replied flatly.

“I'll help you out,” I said. I was feeling generous, or I wanted to irritate Hanji. Sometimes it's hard to tell where exactly my intentions fall. “If you ask, the answer is no. If you just  _do_ , ain't nobody gonna say shit. I normally charge people before giving advice, but it's important to get a crash course in HR policy on your first day.”

Christa gave me a reproachful look, but Ymir laughed loudly. I had to look away from her wide-open mouth, the view of half-chewed food being one I could never really stand.

“God, I hate it when you talk like that. You know English better than half the native speakers around you, yet you still sound like an idiot.” Ymir grinned at me, flashing her abnormally long canines.

“J'te déteste et j'espère que tu vas crever bientôt.” I shrugged with a smirk. Ah, the joys of being the only Francophone in the vicinity.

I glanced around the shop, noting the few students here and there that were trying to finish papers or cramming before a test. I had put a disturbing lack of work into my own assignments, but with any luck I could head to the library early and start working on my paper for Politics and Diversity. It wasn't due this week, but it was worth 30% of my grade. I also happened to find the topic interesting, which was never a bad spot to find yourself in.

“Ooh, are you Italian?” Sasha asked interestedly. I noticed that she had already taken a pumpkin scone from the baked goods case, little orange crumbs at the edge of her lips. I raised a brow at her question.

“Did you take Italian?” I asked her, hoping that she hadn't for my sake more than hers. There's a certain level of stupid that tends to break my brain.

Sasha's face crumpled slightly, and I made a mental note to tone it down around her for the time being. “No, I took Spanish?” she replied, brows knitted together.

“Okay. I know they told you that the romance languages all sound similar, and maybe to you they do if you don't what to listen for, but no. I speak French.” I explained. Her eyes lit up.

“France? Oh, wow, I've heard—” she began excitedly.

“ _Quebec_.” I cut her off with a single word.

“Ooh. What part of France is that in?”

“Are you fucking ser—?”

It was my turn to be cut off as Sasha burst into laughter, spraying a few stray crumbs out of her mouth. Of course, as she was facing me, said crumbs landed on me. “I'm sorry, I'm sorry. You set yourself up for that.” she panted between giggles, actually holding her stomach with one hand like some slapstick caricature.

I looked down as she giggled. Sure enough, there were little orange specks on my apron, and a few on my arm. I was very tempted to slap that damn scone out of Sasha’s hand. “Get me a fucking bucket of ethanol before I have to amputate. I’ve never cauterized anything before.” I bit out, walking over to the sink to put my arm under scalding water. I came dangerously close to giving myself another burn.

“Sorry, he's got a germ thing.” I could just  _hear_ Ymir rolling her eyes.

“Be nice, Ymir,” I taunted, turning to glare at her. “What if I have OCD? I can open door you for harassing me for my disability.”

“Or maybe they'd just fire  _you_  for being such a god damn pain in the ass.”

“How about I fire both of you for wiping your asses with shop policy?” Hanji's voice sounded behind me.

Christa was holding back silent giggles as I scrubbed my arm clean, muttering as many profanities under my breath as I could. There's a beautiful thing about Quebecois profanities, in that you can chain them together endlessly to form one giant rage-induced swear.

“Sasha,” Hanji spoke again. “Don't listen to these two. If I catch you taking things out of the case I have to dock your pay.”

Hanji’s tone was light, conversational, but a glance at Sasha brushing her hand against the face to hide the orange crumbs could not have been more of a dead giveaway. I laughed, irritability shelved for the time being. While she was in the back, Hanji had discarded her apron and put on a bright red pea coat that I thought actually made her look pretty cute.

“Why do you get to leave?” I asked pointedly, shutting off the water and drying my arm on the cleanest towel hanging above the sink.

“I wasn’t even supposed to be here today!” she said a little defensively.

“Oh, you’re right. I’ll get my coat.” I said with a mock cheerful voice that didn't suit me. Hanji seemed to go through a desperate inner struggle in a very short period of time, brows constricted and mouth tilted.

“I can’t decide if I want to make you stay here until close or let you leave at noon. Christa, what should I do?” Hanji asked. I whipped around to shoot Christa my most threatening glare, but she was too busy smirking at Ymir. God, Ymir rubbed off on her in the worst ways sometimes.

“What are you looking at me for? I don’t want to put up with that short shit all day.” Ymir shrugged at her blonde shadow.

“Hahaha!” Hanji tossed her head back with a loud cackle, patting me on the shoulder as though Ymir making fun of my height was the funniest thing she’d ever heard. “Okay, okay. You can leave when Petra is off lunch. Do me a favor and clean the shop before you leave, we had more of a crowd than usual this morning.”

“What’s the occasion?” I asked, glad that I had an iron-clad excuse to ditch register duty early.

“No idea. I’ll see you guys tomorrow morning!” Hanji waved before disappearing out of the side door, most likely before another stampeding crowd of caffeine addicted college kids could prevent her from being able to leave with a clear conscience.

At 11:45, people began trickling in for lunch. I had made quick work of the giant mess the shop was left in, Christa being kind enough to watch the register for me, and now found myself waiting for the crowd of people to thin so I could pull a Hanji. Petra was looking distinctly more alive as she kept a steady rotation of food and coffee moving, Christa helping Sasha make basic drinks while Ymir whipped up some of the more complicated orders.

On order #248, according to the register, I glanced at the clock again. Petra had already been off of lunch for over an hour, but the line seemed to never end. I was nearing the end of my benevolent demeanor as I tied to take a 7 drink order from someone who couldn’t get off their phone long enough to give me a full order if her life depended on it.

I took 10 seconds to look down and rub the bridge of my nose, feeling a headache coming on. I wasn’t sure if it was the customers, the never-ending smell of coffee, or both.

“Hey!” a bright voice greeted, and I glanced up at the familiarity. I saw a wide smile and blue-green eyes. I had been so focused on getting through the line of customers that I hadn’t even noticed Eren was in the shop. I stole a quick glance behind him; there was no one. _Finally_.

“Ugh, why are you even here? You said I didn’t have to see you until next week.” I grumbled moodily before I could really stop myself. I’m not saying I was worried about it, because Eren had already kind of proven that he couldn’t be fucked to care about some short dick that worked in a coffee shop, but I was glad Hanji was long gone.

“Don’t be an ass,” Eren laughed. “I’ll have a medium 1 pump caramel, 1 pump white mocha, iced latte with two shots apagotto style with extra whipped cream and mocha drizzle. Put it in a large to-go cup with extra ice.”

The fucking … I wasn’t even sure what Eren had just tried to order. I looked at him open-mouthed, trying to force the words “get out” through my lips, but I just mouthed at him soundlessly. The little shit looked extremely pleased with his own cleverness.

“I’m kidding, I’m kidding, I just want a large coffee.” He handed over his debit card and I rang him up, determined not to say anything else that could potentially get me written up. “So, Levi.” 

“Yes?” I replied, scribbling his name and order on a cup before handing it off to some new person I didn’t know.

“Oh. Nothing,” Eren looked a little embarrassed, and I felt a little of my irritation lift. “It’s just that you wouldn’t tell me your name last night.” he added helpfully with a bashful grin. I wasn’t sure if it was an act or if he was genuinely shy, but it was adorable either way.

“Right,” I blinked at him, then remembered the painting I had tucked in my bag. “Uh, hey, do you have class soon?” I asked.

“Huh? No, I’m finished for today. I have work in an hour, though.” Eren looked at me questioningly.

“Could you hang around for a minute? I’m off now; I just need to grab my stuff.” I gestured to the back room vaguely. His brows rose a little comically, but he gave me an earnest smile.

“Yeah, sure. I’ll be here.”

“I’m leaving!” I told the general direction of my coworkers, punching out on the register and walking quickly into the back before anyone could try to stop me. I had stayed through lunch, mostly, so they couldn’t really complain.

I hadn’t really intended to ask Eren to hang around, or to give him the painting, or at least it hadn’t occurred to me? It was one of those strange instances where I had decided I was going to do something without knowing it, and I had just acted on that decision as the thoughts formed consciously in my head.

When I left the back room, I caught Eren sitting at a table by the window. He was resting his head in one hand, gazing out the window with a pen halted over a sheet of paper, coffee cup letting off steam. I approached him, not sure if I should sit or not. “Hey, brat.” I greeted.

Eren looked up at me, eyes a little unfocused as though I had pulled him from an extremely deep thought. I glanced down at his notebook, which was filled with hasty scrawls and crossed out lines, arrows in red ink pointing here and there with a word at the end. Eren unconsciously moved his hand to cover most of what he’d written, a move I understood. I wasn’t shy about my painting, not in any sense, but I didn’t like people to watch me work.

“Shouldn’t you reserve the term brat for someone who acts like one? Like, say, a grown man who would refuse to give his name?” he teased, flipping the notebook closed and stowing it in his bag.

“Yeah, cute,” I sneered at him, but I had the distinct feeling that I hadn’t shot enough venom at Eren to make him worry about it. “Here.”

I pulled the watercolor out of my bag, still flat and smooth from the time it had spent between my text books. Eren looked at it without moving, then took it with one hand and looked down at it. The emotions showed plainly on his face; confusion, understanding, and then a sort of shy contentment. “Did you paint this?” he asked, tilting his head back to look at me.

“I took it from some poor art student,” I replied with my usual deadpan tone. “Of course I painted it, idiot.”

“For me?” the smile on Eren’s face widened, if that was even possible.

“What? No, I —” I stumbled a bit on the words. “I thought you might like it when I was finished.” I mumbled awkwardly.

“I do!” he said hurriedly, looking from the paper to my face, then back again. “I love it. Thanks!”

“Yeah, sure,” I shrugged, feeling a little awkward, like when you want to end a conversation but aren’t sure how. “Bye” was the best I could come up with.

Eren was beside me sipping his coffee as I pushed open the door; I looked up at him, hoping my face would convey the “what the fuck do you want” feeling I was trying to work into his head. The whole thing that had just happened was weird and I was uncomfortable and I was pretty sure I didn’t want to see this kid again until I had to. However, he didn’t seem to really pick up on that, instead falling into step with me.

“Did you like the show?” he asked brightly. It bothered me how much taller than me he was.

“What do you think?”

“I think you’re kind of a dick, to be honest.”

I stopped walking abruptly, and Eren did too, looking at me with this fucking expression, like he was daring me to contradict what he had just said because he knew he was right. “Yes, well, now we have  _that_ out of the way, thank you by the way, what do you want?”

“Well, I’m hanging out with some friends later, I thought maybe you could drop in if you wanted,” he said, his smile crooked, posture confident. He was intense as he looked at me, the same kind of intensity that had come out through his fingers and transformed into music. “The more the merrier!”

Honestly, I wasn’t sure how to respond. I didn’t want to go “hang out” with him and his friends, but chances were that I could have a few drinks and then take a pleasant, drunken walk home. On the other hand, I didn’t want to deal with him. Or his friends.

“Can I bring Hanji?” I asked, keeping my tone neutral. If he said no, I would politely decline.

“The more the merrier?” Eren repeated, this time in the form of a question. Considering my own tendency to be a sarcastic little shit, I didn’t feel it was entirely fair to be irritated with him.

“Oi, okay, I get it. Do you have her number?” I turned to resume walking to my bike. The crunch of Eren’s shoes told me he was following.

“Yup! I can text her the address. You guys can show up anytime between 8 and 4.” I could feel his excitement, and I felt a tiny bit bad that I only planned to go so that I could snag some of the free alcohol. I didn’t have to tell him that, though.

“Okay.” I placed my bike lock in my bag, then hopped on my bike and took off toward the street. By the time I hit the road, I already regretted agreeing to go.

\- - - - - -

I have a few different “rituals,” for lack of a better term, that I tend to slip into unintentionally. I found myself freshly showered for the second time, laying down on the floor in my apartment while music played quietly in the background. My memories of Montreal were disjointed and faded a little more every day, despite how hard I had tried to cling to them.

I was always going to be more American than I was Quebecois, but I couldn’t help feeling like it was a piece of my identity that I was losing and would never replace. I filled in the gaps where I could, and music had always proved to be a good fit.

_Et si je vous disais que même au milieu d'une foule_

_Chacun, par sa solitude, a le coeur qui s'écroule_

_Que même inondé par les regards de ceux qui nous aiment_

_On ne récolte pas toujours les rêves que l'on sème_

I had spent hours in the library researching my paper after I left Room 23. I’d only made a few pages progress, which I was sure I was going to rewrite the next time I sat down to tackle it. I’m not much of a writer; it’s a boring and tedious task to me. Where I could write 5,000 words and not express a single thing, I could use a paint brush to lay my soul bare on a stretch of canvas in a few hours.

_Déjà quand la vie vient pour habiter_

_Ces corps aussi petits qu'inanimés_

_Elle est là telle une déesse gardienne_

_Attroupant les solitudes par centaines_

I was counting down the time until Hanji showed up at my apartment to take me away from peaceful solitude. The longer I laid on the cold wood, the more I didn’t want to be unceremoniously dropped into an apartment full of people I didn’t know, inebriated and loud and generally making a mess of the night. I was trying not to make a list of the reasons that I shouldn’t show up at Eren’s place, but they seem to spring fully formed into my head whether I’m welcoming of them or not.

Pros:

  * Free alcohol.

  * Spending time with Hanji.

  * Something to do other than brood in my apartment.




Cons:

  * I don’t know Eren.

  * I don’t know anyone that Eren knows.

  * I can’t stand being around drunk people.

  * There was no guarantee I could find a space with proper quietude to occupy.




I had only said yes because I didn’t want to be a dick.

_Cette mère Marie, mère chimère de patrie_

_Celle qui viendra nous arracher la vie_

_Celle qui, comme l'enfant, nous tend la main_

_Pour mieux tordre le cou du destin_

Hanji let herself into my apartment. I heard her footsteps across the floor, and looked up at her as she stood over me and looked down. I honestly hadn’t heard her knock on the door, and her casual glance toward my laptop indicated that she understood.

“Oh, Levi, Levi, you poor angsty son of a bitch.” she grinned, an uncharacteristically soft grin as I continued to look at her steadily.

_Et on pleure, oui on pleure la destinée de l'homme_

_Sachant combien, même géants, tout petits nous sommes_

There were few people that really understood me, or maybe that was my mind’s way of keeping myself isolated, but the magnitude of her joining me on the floor and simply looking at the ceiling in silence was one that I knew she understood.

“We can stay here.” She said quietly after a few verses. I turned my head to look at her; she didn’t even seem disappointed. I was tempted to take her up on that.

“I should at least drop in.” I turned my head back to look at the ceiling with her, wondering if my landlord would completely flip her shit if I extended my mural to the ceiling. By the time I moved out, I was sure, the entire apartment was going to be covered in paint. It would either prevent me from getting my deposit back, or rake the woman quite a heftier sum than I was paying each month.

_Car, tel seul un homme, nous avançons_

_Vers la même lumière, vers la même frontière_

_Toujours elle viendra nous arracher la vie_

_Comme si chaque bonheur devait être puni_

I placed my hand on Hanji’s; she gave my fingers a gentle squeeze. The silent communication that passed between us made me feel marginally better. I sang along with the last few lyrics, a beautifully poetic phrase that I had understood over the years all too well.

_Et on pleure, oui on pleure la destinée de l'homme_

_Sachant combien, même géants, tout petits nous sommes_

 


	4. Get Lucky

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> New faces, awkwardness, unagi, scheming Hanji, and sleeping over.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Song is Get Lucky, artist is Daft Punk.
> 
> Upped the rating because of stuff, things. I had trouble writing this chapter so hopefully it is adequate. Oh, and Electronic Super Joy is one of the most enraging games ever, also its mention is a subtle nod to Log On. Great fic, go read it.
> 
> Finally got the ball actually rolling on Ereri.
> 
> Thank you beta-chan (rapinii.tumblr.com) for being beta-chan and enjoying my lyric/list combo.

There never was, is, never will be an amount of bitching that can change Hanji's mind about certain things. Usually stupid things, things that no other person would complain about, but always the sort of thing that made me seethe quietly. It amused her to no end.

Tonight it was taking the subway instead of driving. I spent the entire commute touching as little of the station and train as possible, while she hung onto the handrails like a monkey and talked animatedly about I don't even know what. No matter what, subway systems are always dirty and smell distinctly of piss. It was like a universal law.

The walk to Eren's not-apartment was short once we managed to ditch the filthy underground. I was a little shocked to find myself facing an old Victorian row house, constructed entirely of brick and with a dark wooden front door fit with intricate glass panels. Hanji opened the iron fence and bounded up the stairs excitedly, looking over her shoulder when she realized that I wasn't next to her. “Nervous?” she teased.

“No,” I followed her, knocking loudly on the door. “He just didn't seem like the loaded type.”

We stood there for a moment, chill creeping up on us now that we weren't walking. I could hear voices and some techno-ish music coming from inside, and had someone not answered the door a split second later I would have grabbed Hanji's arm and dragged her away. It already sounded like the kind of thing I didn't want to be a part of.

“Hey!” the guy was obviously a little tipsy, his cheeks tinted red. I had seen him come in the shop when Eren had played, the weird long face and two-tone hair that I couldn't figure out. Was it _intentional_? Because it looked fucking stupid. “Who're you here for?”

“Eren invited us,” Hanji grinned at the guy, holding out her hand. “I'm Hanji. This is Levi. He won't touch your hand so don't bother being polite with him!”

They shook, and he introduced himself as Jean, then gave me a weird look like he wasn't sure that Hanji was serious. When I didn't offer him my hand, he looked away. “Right on. Come in, come in, welcome.”

Hanji and I followed Jean inside. I noticed that he wore tight-fitting jeans that hugged his ass perfectly, and the appeal of hanging around for the night increased ever so slightly. I rarely acted on attraction, but I was never against good eye candy.

“He's in here.” Jean said, leading us to what must have been a living room. It was crammed with couches, mismatched chairs, and a few bean bags, looking entirely like an oversized college dorm. I was puzzled by that point, to say the least.

The room held familiar faces; Mikasa, Eren, eyepatch guy (who I later learned was Marco), and girl-boy (Armin) were sitting in a half circle, each pressing keys on their keyboards furiously. They all seemed to be playing the same game, which was the source of the techno music. A guy with a shaved head was sitting at a closed laptop, watching the game progress on Armin's computer.

“Electronic Super Joy tournament,” Jean explained to us. “Connie's already out, and—” he reached over Eren's shoulder, tapping random keys until Eren's player fell. Eren whipped his head around. “Now Eren is too!”

“I hate you so much, Jean,” Eren huffed, but when he spotted Hanji and I the sour look left his face at once, replaced with the most adorable and excited grin I've seen in my life. “Hey guys! Now that you're _finally here_ , we can get food.” his grin switched smoothly into a friendly smirk.

“Sorry, Eren!” Hanji did her best to look apologetic enough for two, as she knew that I wasn't about to go assuring Eren that I was sorry about anything. “We didn't know you were waiting on us.”

“That's okay! We're going for Chinese, that okay with you two?”

“Of course!” Hanji threw an arm around my shoulders that I had trouble not slapping away.

“Good, because it took _forever_ to get Eren and Jean to agree on anything.” Armin looked up from his laptop, and I couldn't quite tell if he was genuinely irritated or teasing. The ponytail he was currently sporting, I noticed, made him look a touch less feminine.

The prospect of getting some food seemed to break up the little “tournament.” I shook hands with people I didn't know, somehow making it through introductions without feeling the need to get the fuck home (it's a common problem). Eren's friends seemed decent, and I was glad to know that.

Mikasa stood up, coming to stand next to Hanji and I with a notepad in her hands. “We're ordering from Red Lantern, but I'm stopping by Ryoko's since it's right over there. What do you guys want?”

“Chirashi for both of us,” Hanji smiled at Mikasa, who looked just as stoic as she had the last time I had seen her. “And four unagi rolls for Levi.” Hanji gestured at me while Mikasa wrote down our order. I wandered a few steps away from Hanji, taking in the sight of the next room over. It was much like the living room, crammed with such mismatched furniture that it couldn't have been intentional. There were several different IKEA chairs seated around several different IKEA tables to make a long dining table, two different cabinets with glass doors displaying a set of dishes that were every color of the rainbow.

“How many people live here?” I asked no one in particular.

“We all do?” Armin replied, puzzled. I felt my brows automatically raise at that.

“I have never met a landlord that would be okay with this.”

“It's Marco's parents' house,” Connie came out from behind the table, back pressed against the wall to avoid knocking into it and sending laptops flying. “I don't think they really _know_ there are nine of us, though.”

“N...nine of you?” I won't lie, I was a touch horrified at the concept of nine people — nine college age people — living in one house. I tried to do a quick head count, but Hanji and Mikasa had disappeared, presumably to get food, and there definitely weren't nine people hanging around the living room.

“Hey everyone,” Eren poked his head out of the kitchen, then gestured at me. “This is Levi. He works over at Room 23.”

I felt miniscule as four pairs of eyes found me, but I was quickly saved by Eren. I would have to teach him my no-touching rule, but I was still glad to be pulled into the kitchen. “Want a drink?” Eren asked, pulling a bottle of Angry Orchard out of the refrigerator.

“Uh, sure. Cider is fine.” I shrugged, taking the bottle he handed me.

“You alright?” he asked, head tilted to the side. I would also have to teach him that pointing out that someone is uncomfortable when they're uncomfortable isn't helpful.

Wait, what? Why the fuck did I need to teach this kid anything? I found the voice in the back of my mind was a little miffed, to say the least.

“Yep.” I twisted the cap off my cider, taking far too long of a drink. Eren handed me a second, looking somewhere between disbelieving and amused.

Loud music suddenly blared from the living room, followed by laughter as the volume was adjusted down. I was well aware that Eren was watching me closely, and I had already sat one bottle of cider on the sink and was about to open a second. I mentally cursed Hanji for ditching me, something I had thought she knew better than to do in a house full of strangers, but it wasn't really her fault. It was useless being angry with her, which didn't really assuage my anger, but at least pushed it out of my head.

_Like the legend of the phoenix_

_All ends with beginnings_

_What keeps the planet spinning_

_The force of love beginning_

I almost groaned at the opening lyrics, having been completely incapable of escaping Daft Punk for the entire summer I had spent in the coffee shop. It was there when I made a latte, it was there when I happened to flip on The Colbert Report when I got home, it was there when I biked to the store and got stuck beside someone with their car windows down and radio volume up.

_We've come too far to give up who we are_

_So let's raise the bar and our cups to the stars_

“What's outside?” I asked Eren after several moments of silence, gesturing to the door at the end of the kitchen.

“Fire pit, chairs, the usual.” Eren shrugged. I was glad he didn't say something stupid, like “the outdoors.”

_She's up all night 'til the sun_

_We're up all night to get some_

_We're up all night for good fun_

_We're up all night to get lucky_

Several voices had joined in with the music, giggles and stumbling footsteps that made me sure that they hadn't exactly waited for Hanji and I to show up to start drinking.

_We're up all night to get lucky_

_We're up all night to get lucky_

_We're up all night—_

A sudden crash came from the living room, and more shouts of laughter, loud enough to drown out the song.

Eren looked me over, seeming unconcerned, then headed outside. I followed him, debating internally whether he had picked up on the fact that I was ready to be out of the house or just wandered outside because I had said something about it. I wasn't sure why it really _mattered_ , but I appreciated the fresh air even though it came with a late autumn chill.

“Cold enough for a fire, you think?” Eren asked, nudging a few logs with his foot that looked to be half burnt already. I shivered, then nodded my head.

“Yeah, sure.”

I could still hear muffled music from inside, along with muffled shouts and rapidly moving shadows across the windows. I looked around the small back yard, impressed despite its small size. A few trees lined the fence that separated it from the rest of the back yards. Colored glass was inlaid along the stone path, around the fire pit, and leading to a fountain that wasn't currently turned on. I noticed that it seemed to be a little overrun with greenery, and laughed at the familiarity of college student “management.”

Eren deposited an egg crate underneath the logs; I raised my brow at him in confusion, but he explained. “Connie saw this on LifeHacks or something. No one ever cleans the lint tray in the dryer and we go through a ton of eggs, so...” he shrugged and lit a lighter, catching the edge of the crate. The fire flickered a few times before the carton was suddenly a giant ball of burning lint and cardboard. I blinked as Eren jumped back.

“Effective.” I commented. There were a set of Adirondack chairs circling the fire pit, each with a brightly patterned cushion. I wandered over to sit in one with a loud sigh, finding them much more comfortable than they looked.

“I think I singed off my eyebrows.” Eren grumbled under his breath. He disappeared behind me for a few seconds, then came back carrying a large drink dispenser that was full to the brim with bright, fizzy liquid and two red solo cups that were so stereotypical I almost laughed. He set it on a rusted cafe table near the fence.

“I don't normally try things I read on the internet for that reason,” I relaxed against the chair. “What's in the barrel?”

“Uh, dunno,” Eren dispensed us each a cup and handed me one. I hesitated to take it. “I mean, it's stuff Mikasa makes for gatherings. It's like, sparkling wine and pomegranate juice and—” I took the cup from him, my fingers brushing against his, and he grinned crookedly. “Pomegranate?”

“Yep.” I finished off my cider while Eren flopped into the chair next to me, slopping a little of his drink on his shirt. He mumbled a curse under his breath.

We drank together quietly, and it occurred to me as Eren looked quietly into the fire that he was acting a great deal differently with me alone than he did in the shop. I wasn't sure if he was nervous or comfortable, but I didn't have time to contemplate it as a crowd came pouring from the back kitchen door. Hanji was grinning at me like a fucking idiot; she rushed forward to take the seat across from me, I knew so that she could watch me and make mental notes about whatever it was she was suddenly interested in. Considering I was sitting alone with Eren, I didn't want to know.

“Chirashi!” Mikasa gave me a large glass bowl with lacquered chopsticks, a nice touch considering I was sure that my dinner had come in a Styrofoam box. “And unagi!” she handed me a small plate, taking the chair next to mine and immediately digging into her own bowl.

“What's that?” Eren asked curiously. At some point he had started eating what looked like orange chicken, but he was looking at my unagi curiously.

“Eel.” I replied. I poked at it with a chopstick, finding it to be soft, then picked it up. It was far too large to eat with one bite, but I was pleased when the first bite was soft and flaky.

“Can I try?”

“Eren,” Mikasa laughed his name, and I turned to look at her. She had the exact meal I had ordered. “You inspired me,” she said to me, before turning back to Eren. “I've been eating eel since I met you and I have never convinced you to even smell it.”

“If you want eel, go buy some eel.” I shrugged, eating the second half of the roll between my chopsticks. Jean laughed loudly, slapping Eren on the shoulder.

“I like this guy!” Jean said simple, receiving a dark glare from Eren, whose ears were slightly red.

“You would, Jean.” he started, but seemed to realize what he said as soon as he spoke, turning to look at me with horrified eyes.

“I see...” I said smoothly before Eren could launch into an awkward apology. I made to get out of my chair, but felt a hand — Hanji's hand — pull me back by the shoulder. When had she even come over?

“You're going to make the kid cry, Levi, stop being a dick.” her voice was louder than everyone else's and twice as cheerful, which was always amazing to me as Hanji didn't actually drink that much.

“I'm not going to cry.” Eren scoffed, waving his hand with chopsticks around as he spoke. I picked up one of my unagi rolls, a little sad to part with it, but placed it on the side of Eren's dish. “Thanks!”

“If you spit it out, you will die.” I told him simply. He laughed, picking it up with his chopsticks and turning it a few times as though trying to figure out how to fit the entire thing in his mouth. I chuckled at the display, but he came to the same conclusion I did and bit half the roll away, dropping the rest on his plate while he chewed.

“I'm impressed,” Mikasa spoke up. She was leaning forward to look around me at Eren, her stoic expression replaced by something borderline motherly. “I don't think Eren has tried new food since we started at BU.”

“No, no, he swallowed the goldfish Marco won at Octoberfest, remember?” Jean grinned at Mikasa, who was laughing. I took the opportunity to sit back and eat so that I could observe.

“How could anyone forget?” Connie pulled a chair next to Mikasa's, leaning over with his head between his knees and yelling in what was clearly supposed to be drunken gibberish that there was a fish stuck in his throat. Eren laughed along with everyone else, rolling his eyes while he did so.

“And that was the day we all learned, never dare Eren to do anything when he's drunk.” Armin piped up; I could hear the eye-roll in his voice.

“Maybe it's a better idea to just not let Eren get drunk.” Jean said, a little derisively. I couldn't figure out whether they were best friends or completely hated each other, but I supposed the fact that they lived in the same house was a good indicator.

I downed the remainder of my drink while Marco took the chair next to Jean, immediately pulling Jean's attention away from the rest of us. Connie was looking a little bored as he ate, while Armin's arrival had drawn Eren and Mikasa both into a discussion. I glanced around for Hanji, but she had disappeared at some point. She was being a little too ninja-esque for my liking tonight.

“Hey, Eren,” I got up, placing my food on the cushion I'd just vacated. “Where's your bathroom?”

“Uh,” he looked confused for a few seconds. “Hallway between the kitchen and the stairs, first door on the left.”

It was strangely quiet inside when I made it to the back door. There was still music coming from somewhere, the unmistakeably robotic voices of more Daft Punk grating on my nerves a little. I followed the hallway past a staircase that had the remains of someone's laundry on it, hoping to whatever powers that may be that the bathroom was a semblance of clean. I didn't really feel like trying to take a piss outside when there were so many people around, but I was not above it.

I realized, as I saw a door on the right and a door on the left, that I hadn't really been paying attention to what Eren had said. “Not like I'm snooping.” I muttered to myself, choosing the door on the right and pushing it open. I had one foot inside the room when I stopped. It felt like time froze for me, and I'm sure I looked pretty comical mid-step and an expression of _I don't fucking know what_ on my face.

It took approximately 10 seconds for me to realize what exactly I was seeing. I looked from a tall, olive skinned guy on his knees to a blonde girl that had to be half his size with her arms bound behind her back. She was laying across a body I could barely make out due to the fact that she was sitting on the guy's fucking face. Said guy's muscular legs were wrapped around the other guy, his hands gripping the girl's hips so hard that I could see small bruises around her thighs. I made a noise, something that sounded like a cross between a laugh and “oh fuck,” and the three stopped dead as they were suddenly aware that someone had come in the room.

Like slow motion, the guy on his knees turned, his eyes wide and looking remarkably like a deer in headlights. I heard muffled laughter as the girl looked up, dick falling out of her mouth unceremoniously, and I was suddenly aware that the big guy on bottom was _bottoming_ , if you know what I mean.

“Get out?” the blonde girl spoke after an awkward moment that seemed to have spanned several days. Her voice was flat and completely disinterested, like I had interrupted them making a sandwich. The _food_ kind, I mean. Not the sex kind.

Obviously, I did just as she asked. I stepped around the door, making a very obvious show of turning the lock, and backed out. I didn't manage to prevent myself from laughing, loudly, as I went into the bathroom. It's not like I wasn't fucking mortified, but the look on the poor guy's face had been nothing short of traumatized. I couldn't help but find it hilarious.

I could hear a chorus of “Bertl, it's okay!” as I re-entered the hallway, and bit my tongue again to keep from bursting into more laughter. The poor dude had looked pretty fucking horrified, so I thought maybe hearing me laugh all the way outside was the opposite of what he needed. I'm pretty considerate that way.

When I re-joined the group, I noticed that half the group had disappeared, leaving Eren, Jean, and Marco still around the fire. “What?” Eren asked when I reached him. I was still having trouble keeping in my laughter, and he looked baffled.

“Nothing, nothing,” I picked up my chirashi, noting that my unagi had also disappeared, but sat without mentioning it. It's not like I had paid for it. “Where is everyone?”

“Bored, apparently,” Eren shrugged. “There's a movie theater near by, but I don't really feel like it.”

“Okay...” I blinked, a little surprised that Hanji hadn't waited around to see whether or not I wanted to go.

“Good night, guys. Nice meeting you, Levi.” Jean said, and Marco voiced his agreement. I gave them a nod as they started walking back up toward the house, conversing quietly.

“Did you want to go to the movie?” Eren asked. I wondered if he had stayed behind for my benefit.

“Nah. Two is a good number for me.” I replied as I made quick work of my dinner.

“Eh?” Eren looked confused.

“One,” I pointed at myself, “Two.” I pointed at him.

“Because there's no possible way you could have been any more vague.” Eren refilled my solo cup without asking, leaning back in his chair and looking up at the sky. The light pollution around Boston prevented us from really seeing much in the way of stars, but the sky was a nice gradient of blue and gray.

“So, do you live with amateur porn stars?” I asked conversationally. Eren choked on his drink, looking up in alarm.

“Oh, god. Door on the left, I said door on the _left_!” he laughed once he'd managed to swallow his drink rather than spray it everywhere.

“You might as well get a dorm,” I leaned back against the seat, kicking my feet up on the edge of the fire pit. “They're probably more private than what you've got going here.”

“No way!” Eren laughed. “We don't really have to worry about that anyway. Um, sorry for not warning you about...”

“Nah,” I took a long drink. “If you'd told me your house was host to orgies ahead of time, I would have brought my gimp mask and things would have been all _awkward_.”

Eren snorted into his glass. “Are threesomes technically orgies?”

“Like I fucking know, brat.”

We both laughed, then fell quiet. It was pretty comfortable for me, but I wasn't sure how Eren felt about being around quiet people. I turned my head to look at him; he was gazing into the fire intently, one brow furrowed as though he were lost in thought. When he sensed that I was looking, or maybe he just got curious, he turned to glance at me. “What's up?” he asked. I shrugged in response, but didn't look away. He was nice to look at, nothing remarkable, but handsome. His eyes, on the other hand...

“You ever modeled before?” I asked, and he looked a little alarmed.

“Model? Like... for a magazine or something?” his voice was confused again, and I didn't blame him for averting his eyes when I snorted. I hadn't meant to laugh in his face, but he had this weird tendency to suddenly be adorable.

“I'm an artist, remember?” I asked. Realization and embarrassment dawned on his face at the same time.

“Oh, right. Well, no, obviously.” Eren grinned, though his cheeks were still a little pink. I couldn't read what he made of the conversation, which told me that he likely didn't understand what I was getting at.

“Would you model for me sometime?” I asked. Eren was quiet, looking away and back into the fire.

“What does that involve, exactly? I spend a lot of time on my music, to be honest.” he said finally.

“I can come here, or you can come to my place. You can do whatever you normally do. I'll just watch and paint,” I glanced toward the house again. I could see movement in the kitchen, but as everyone else was at a movie I had a feeling the three shapes I saw were the threesome I had accidentally interrupted. “I have more space, and probably more peace and quiet than you do, though.”

“Peace and quiet, that's tempting,” Eren said, then was quiet again. I placed my bowl on an empty chair and got up to refill my drink, which was good even though it had lost its carbonation. “Yeah, sure. When?”

“Whenever,” I said vaguely, more intent on getting a more decent buzz going than the one I currently had. Eren looked back at me, brow quirked. “Put your number in your phone,” I said, then shook my head. “I mean my number. Shit.” I corrected myself as Eren laughed.

“Want me to drive you?” he asked.

“Are you shitting me? You've been drinking too, idiot.” I snapped.

“Fair enough.”

“Don't fucking tell me you drive when you've been drinking.” I glared at him, placing a hand on my hip. He looked a little alarmed at my expression.

“No, no, I walk, I was just trying to be polite, damn,” he said in a rush. I continued to glare at him, and he looked a little put out. “Look, my mom died to a drunk driver, trust me, I'd knock someone out if they tried that.”

“I'm sorry.” I said quietly. Eren nodded, and we finished our drinks in silence.

“Wanna crash here? Tonight didn't really go like I expected, I'm bored and tired and tipsy so sleep sounds really awesome right about now.” he said finally. He wandered off to drag a water hose to the fire pit, filling it with water and wandering away to shut it off again.

“Why not?” I shrugged. We walked back to the house, where I tried to avoid the gazes of the three people munching quietly on pizza, but a hand on my shoulder startled me into looking up.

It may not be obvious by this point, but I don't really like being touched. There is a pretty strict standard, usually, that I have before deciding whether or not I will let someone touch me.

  * Do they bathe regularly?

  * Do they keep a clean home?

  * Is their keyboard full of food, or does it have greasy keys?

  * Are they willing to wear clothes more than once without washing them?

  * Am I positive that they wash their hands after using the bathroom?

  * Do they have pets?

  * Do they bite their nails?

  * How clean is their phone?

  * Have they had a threesome lately?




Okay, the last one is made up, but it fits here, and I could honestly go on for days.

“Hey, sorry about that!” the guy whose face I hadn't seen was grinning at me, while the freakishly tall being behind him was looking anywhere but in my direction. “I'm Reiner, that's Bertl, that's Annie.” he talked with his hands, gesturing at the other two. He gave me a handshake so strong it hurt my hand before I could stop him. Annie lifted up a hand in greeting, looking bored as she ate.

“Levi.” I said, hoping that Reiner had showered before he had touched me, but feeling it was probably in the best interest of everyone involved if I didn't bring it up.

Bertl didn't say anything, like Annie, but he nodded; his arms were crossed, but he was giving me an awkward smile that I kind of returned when I noticed just how uncomfortable he looked.

“We were just going to crash,” Eren interrupted the awkwardness, pulling me out of the kitchen by my arm. “Night guys!”

There was a chorus of “good night” in response, and Eren let go of my arm around the staircase. I followed him up and into a room that I could only assume was the master, as it had its own bathroom and was pretty much massive. “Armin sleeps in here too, I hope you don't mind?”

“Really?” I looked around, noting the two double beds that were placed on either side of a bookshelf. I didn't want to be ungracious, but I was feeling more and more like it was probably best to call a cab and go home.

“Well, you can sleep in the music room, but the door doesn't lock...”

“In here is fine,” I looked around, spotting a recliner in the corner. “I'll take the chair?”

“Yeah, sure. Let me get you some clean blankets.” Eren spent a moment on his phone texting, then tossed it on the bookshelf and disappeared. When he returned, he was carrying a thick flannel blanket that smelled like dryer sheets. He tossed me a pillow from his bed, which I decided to be a good guest and not complain about. Kid had no idea how much I was compromising, really.

Eren fell asleep quickly, and I was glad to know that his snoring was much quieter than Hanji's. I stretched out on the recliner, finding it surprisingly comfortable, and turned to look out the window. I caught the scent of something lingering on Eren's pillow, and turned my head further to inhale before I had really thought about it. I flicked my eyes to Eren's sleeping form, then back out the window. I had no idea what had possessed me to come over, much less crash in the kid's bedroom, but I suddenly found myself glad that I had.


	5. Mini-chapter: Jean and Marco

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jean contemplates Marco, Marco has been waiting.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have a back story for what happened to Marco, but it wasn't really appropriate this chapter.
> 
> I'll probably be doing a mini-chapter every now and again. I love Ereri but I also love everyone else.
> 
> More Levi and Eren later this week. :3
> 
> Oh oh also I'm on Tumblr. ghosts-desu.tumblr.com because I'm very creative.

[Jean POV]

I was uncomfortably aware that Marco had glanced over his shoulder several times as we made our way to the kitchen door. Eren and his friend were quiet. I wasn’t sure if it was the idiot’s attempt at a date or if he was just trying to make friends outside of the house, but Levi was weird and it didn’t seem like it was in a good way.

“Stop looking over your shoulder, you’re being weird.” I muttered to Marco, who smiled in response.

“They’re not paying us any attention.” His voice was soft, like always, and held a gentle kindness that made my stomach flip-flop.

The kitchen was empty and quiet. We walked by the lamp Armin had overturned earlier, Marco pausing to fix it while I turned off the radio. Our footsteps were loud as we made our way up the stairs, down the hall, and then started up the narrow steps that led to the attic. I let Marco go first, which I had been doing unconsciously since the accident; his depth perception was bad, having one eye and all. He had laughed at my worry more times than I could count. “I’m not going to suddenly forget how to climb stairs!” he would giggle at me.

I couldn’t help it.

Our bedroom was small, with a sloped ceiling that we both had bumped heads on, but it was the best room in the house. I liked the privacy, but Marco enjoyed our large, front facing window with a view of the bay, and the aged wood of the floor and support beams “added character,” whatever that means. He got to work almost immediately hanging blinds and putting in lamps with red shades for color. My own stuff was gray, cheap, and served its purpose, but he seemed to like making his side of the room look nice.

The two of us had spent the summer building a reading nook under the window, which I think was mainly a distraction for him. He wasn’t a complainer like Eren, but I sometimes caught him reaching up to feel his empty eye socket. It bothered him a great deal, which I couldn’t even understand if I tried, so I  bought lumber and fabric from Home Depot and pulled plans off the internet. We wound up with a lot of splinters, allergic reactions to sawdust, and a few hammer injuries, but the grin on his face when I had awkwardly proposed the project had been worth it.

Marco had sewn cushions. They weren’t top quality, but mine were a disaster that he had laughed at for days. I had tossed them in a garbage bag, but came back to our room a few days later to find Marco leaning against them on his bed. They looked like amorphous blobs, but they were  _comfortable_  amorphous blobs.

“So…” Marco sat down on his bed, peeling of his t-shirt and looking at me a little shyly.

“What?” I replied. I walked over to my bed, dragging it by the corner toward Marco’s while he brought his knees up to his chest and watched me.

“I wasn’t sure if…” he trailed off, his cheeks coloring slightly.

We’d had the conversation for the past week, which was getting increasingly more awkward. I paused in moving my bed, looking towards Marco, but he was looking at his hands.

“I can stay over there.” I shrugged, trying to sound casual, but the bottom of my stomach seemed to drop out momentarily. Marco shook his head at my statement.

“Not what I meant.” he swallowed nervously.

I stood there, looking at him. “Oh, come on already, Jean.” Marco stood and dragged the other corner of my bed next to his, jumping back on his own once again so that I could push them fully together without smooshing his legs.

I climbed in my side of the bed, lying down and covering up with my blanket while Marco sprawled over his. It always started out that way, pushing our beds together and pretending that wasn't off. Come morning I knew that I would be laying protectively over him, under his blanket, face buried in his hair.

We hadn’t discussed it, and part of me felt like we needed to. Really needed to. On the other hand, I didn’t want to screw up whatever was happening, and I was afraid discussing it would cause Marco to realize that it was weird.

Our relationship never came up, even though it weighed on me. I felt like  Marco wasn’t the easiest person to room with, which is what started everything, really.

I don’t _blame_ Marco for his nightmares, it’s hard to blame someone for having them, especially when they’re triggered by a life-changing accident. Especially when the accident is your fault. I don't know if we would have wound up in the situation we're in now if the accident hadn't happened, don't know how anything would have gone if I hadn't been so fucking _stupid_.

I was sitting awake on my laptop one night, reading Wikipedia and avoiding sleep when the first incident happened. I felt guilty, felt uncomfortable, and usually stayed up late to avoid thinking. At first, I just heard a whimper, then several. Marco tossed to one side, turned to the other. His legs flailed. I looked up at him, he looked terrified. He had finally been able to take off most of his bandages; the wound that was healing from the corner of his mouth to the edge of his face was red and blotchy, but I could still see freckles around the edges.

I turned back to my laptop when Marco quieted, shrugging it off. A Steam message popped up from Eren, something about playing Final Fantasy already. I was halfway to telling him to fuck off when Marco let out a low cry and thrashed violently.

Without pausing to think, I jumped to my feet and crossed the room, shaking Marco awake. He opened his eye slowly, the frightened expression not leaving until he looked at my face.

“Jean?” he whispered, voice rough, and cleared his throat. “What’s wrong?”

We had laughed, then. We had no idea that it was only going to get worse.

It only took a few weeks for the room to start smelling like paint again, but I didn’t mind the smell. It was a comforting smell I always associated with Marco. I’d realized it when I wandered down the wrong corridor in the art building, wondering why I was suddenly thinking of my new roommate when I caught the smell of acrylic.

Marco’s paintings had changed, though. He had always been a fan of still life and nature, but the first time I saw his canvas after the accident, the canvas was jarringly red. I realized, with a lot of confusion, that it was blood splattered on a broken wall, and he was painting his own corpse lying against it. It mimicked the injury he had now, but it was worse. His face, his shoulder, half of his torso were a mess of gore and I felt suddenly like I shouldn’t be looking.

“I’m sorry, it’s weird.” Marco continued painting as though nothing were out of the ordinary. We spent the night awake, talking of his nightmares. He wouldn’t give me details, only that he died in every dream, and that we lived a life fighting against something we could never defeat. I had pressed him for more, but he shrugged and looked away.

“I’m not sure, exactly. Does it matter? It’s not real.” he was uncomfortable.

“Am I dead?” I asked, and he inhaled sharply.

“Sometimes.”

I never knew what to say. I knew he should seek counseling, or something. Armin, who was the only person in the house I could trust to never, ever let Marco know that I had told, suggested that it may be mild PTSD. We didn’t know for sure, and reading about it on Wikipedia was not as helpful as we’d hoped. We weren’t well versed in psychology.

The paintings never really changed back, but Marco’s advisor and professor was a strange woman, and she encouraged the strange paintings. He had sold prints on Etsy, which confused him as his older art had been mostly overlooked. The most popular piece was a self-portrait, as always with the chunks torn from his body, but this time with dripping red flowers growing out of the cavity. It was beautiful and morbid and no amount of begging from people online or his adviser had convinced Marco to part with the original.

Marco kicked off his jeans in the present, pulling his blanket self-consciously around himself as he tossed them to the foot of his bed and nudged them to the floor. I stole a quick glance at his freckled shoulders, but he was looking at me and I grinned awkwardly and looked away.

“Well, night,” Marco said, turning his back to me. I looked back at the subtle curve of his bicep, reaching out to grab his shoulder and pull him back. “Jean?” he asked, confused, and was going to speak again when I leaned forward and fit my mouth awkwardly against his. His voice died in his throat, mouth not moving, and the five seconds the kiss lasted, my heart hammered in my chest for what seemed like an eternity.

“Uh.” I pulled back, avoiding his eyes, my face burning, fuck, _fuck_.

“J-Jean?” Marco asked again, and I launched into an apology before he could tell me to fuck off or whatever it was he’s about to say.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I don’t know what I was —”

“Jean —”

“Don’t worry about it I just —”

“ _Jean_ —”

“I’ll sleep downstairs so —”

“Shut up!”

I fell silent, looking at Marco and not daring to move or say anything. Underneath the blanket, my fingers were trembling against the surface of my mattress. Marco scooted to the edge of the bed. I could count the freckles on his face, see the exact spot where the scar at the corner of his lips began, but he was still coming closer, whispering my name and taking my fidgeting hand in his own.

My eyes fell automatically closed when he kissed me, tentative and gentle and chaste. A strange sound came from my throat, like a moan, startling me, but I couldn't focus on it. The sheets rustled and Marco was rolling me onto my back, straddling me, taking hold of my wrists and pressing my hands against the mattress. I felt wetness against my lips, and I felt something building in my stomach, warmth. It was sudden and I turned my face away, cheeks heating up as Marco took the opportunity to drag his teeth along my jawline. He flicked his tongue over my ear and whispered in a low rumble that I'd never heard from him, “I heard you in the shower.”

“What?” I fidgeted, trying to sit up, but Marco pressed me back down. His eyes were mischievous, smoldering with arousal, and I struggled to keep up. “How long have you known?”

“A while, Jean, a while.” Marco laughed, and I felt my muscles relax a little at the familiarity. My face burned as I looked away, but I still couldn't do anything but turn my head to the side. Marco placed kisses and nips down my neck, sucking gently at my collarbone. His hair tickled my nose, scent of his shampoo almost overwhelming, but it was comforting. I let myself moan, testing, and Marco sucked harder.

“Ma-Marco, you're going to leave a mark...” I breathed, squirming under him. I was trying to ignore the raging hard-on I had, but it was useless. Marco shifted his hips over mine, and I felt his own erection rub briefly against mine. “ _Fuck_.” I hissed, pressing myself down into the mattress before I could start dry-humping him like a horny teenager. Marco laughed against me, his tongue soothing the teased skin.

“Someone's excited.” Marco said, voice full of amusement. He finally let go of my wrists, and I used the opportunity to lean up on my elbows. Marco sat up, looking at me questioningly.

“I-I...” I looked down, remembering he was only wearing boxers, and looked back to his face. “What just happened?” I laughed, awkwardly, not sure what to do. Should I continue? I wanted to, but I didn't.

“Are you 12?” Marco laughed at me, but it wasn't the same desire-laced sound. It sounded like him, or the him that I knew.

“No,” I was aware that I was pouting, and I flopped back against my pillows. With his lips off my skin, my head felt clearer. “I just...”

“It's alright,” Marco interrupted me. He climbed off, carefully, and I fucking know he intentionally brushed his thigh against my still-hard dick. I gritted my teeth together, face reddening again, as he laid on his own back. “I'm sorry?”

“What?” I rolled over to look at him, shaking my head. “Don't apologize, like something bad happened. I just...” I trailed off again. Marco was looking at me calmly.

“You don't have to figure it out right this second,” he offered, and there it was. That understanding, that obvious caring. I raked a hand through my hair, then nodded. Marco turned onto his side, which wasn't unusual, but my heart dropped a little. “Come here.” he added.

I scooted next to him, and he took my hand and pulled it over his torso. I leaned down into our familiar pose, quiet. I counted the freckles on his shoulders as his breathing evened out, placing soft kisses on his skin. He laughed, quietly, and I felt myself chuckle as well.

When I woke up the next morning, we hadn't moved from the position we had fallen asleep in, my face buried in his hair.


	6. Train Song

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Breakfast with Hanji, duets with Annie, painting Eren.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So actual Ereri in this chapter. It kind of got away from me... this one is a little longer than usual. ;;;;;;;;
> 
> Song: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bVVGHkE--XI
> 
> Thanks beta-chan Rapinii for beta-chan and coffee-addict Eren headcanons.
> 
> I'm going to take a break 'til the weekend so I don't burn out. I've got a lot of things planned... like Eren POV, what happened to Marco, Annie's back story with a lot of Team BRA. I love all the Shingekiz. ;__;

As expected, when I awoke, the sun wasn't up. It wasn't even close to being up. The red letters of the clock on Eren’s bookshelf read 3:12. I sighed at that, knowing I was going to be stuck trudging to my AM classes without the usual semblance of sleep to ride on.

I looked around the room, waiting for my eyes to adjust to the darkness. Eren muttered something in his sleep and rolled over, flinging his arm out and crashing his knuckles against the bookshelf. I waited, but he didn't move after that, and I was a little jealous of his deep slumber. The other bed across the room was empty, whether it was because Armin wasn't keen on sleeping with me in the room or that he hadn't even come up to bed yet, I wasn't sure.

I made my way out of the room quietly and down the stairs. The house was mostly quiet, but I could hear two people conversing quietly in the living room. I poked my head in; Armin and Annie were seated at the table their “gaming tournament” had taken place at. They looked up as I entered.

“Leaving?” Armin asked, checking his watch. Annie was writing in a notebook I recognized as Eren's, using a red pen.

“Yeah. I don't sleep well in strange places.”

“You want a ride?” Annie asked without looking up from the notebook. She was writing quickly in the margins.

“No, I'll call Hanji. Thanks,” I went to the front door; Armin followed me. Up close, he looked exhausted, but gave me a friendly smile. His jaw was a lot stronger when he was standing right by me. I wondered how I’d wound up in a house full of such weirdly attractive people. “Thanks for having me.” I added, to be polite, averting my eyes.

“Thank you for coming.” Armin answered automatically. I gave a half wave as he closed the door behind me; the lock clicked and his footsteps were loud as he walked back in the direction of the living room.

Hanji's phone rang once before she picked up. “Levi! What are you doing calling me!?” she asked, sounding thoroughly put out.

“Come pick me up. Now.” I answered her, remembering my earlier irritation, what with the fucking abandonment and all.

“Seriously?” she was disappointed. It was plainly obvious by this point that she had expected me to hook up with Eren; I had tried to ignore it as she watched us, but she had never been subtle.

“Yes, seriously. Do you think I've got nothing better to do than stick my dick in people I barely know? I'll be over by the metro station. You're buying me breakfast, by the way.”

I hung up irritably, putting my hands in my pockets and heading in the direction of the station. I had fallen asleep in a good mood, but waking up at three in the morning was enough to wreck that, especially with Hanji's bullshit on top of it. I knew her intentions were good, so I wasn't going to hold it against her (maybe I was, a little). It was mostly that I knew there was no way I was going to get a chance to sleep between now and International Law. The best I could say for Thursday, it looked like, was that Hanji was absolutely going to give me the day off or I was going to break her arm. Even that woman could let up occasionally, even if I had to make her.

Thankfully, Hanji only made me wait 15 minutes. She admitted that she hadn't gone home, because despite what she had hoped to happen, she was also not an idiot. I was proud of her for that.

“But Hanji,” I rubbed the bridge of my nose, turning to give her my patented “I'm irritated but I'll get over it so don't get all whiny about it” glare. “Why? Why the fuck?”

When Hanji met my eyes, I was surprised to see she looked sad. “Do you blame me?”

“Blame you? Of course I blame you. I’m trying to make friends, aren’t I? That’s enough, I don’t need you pushing me in directions I don’t even know I want to go.” I looked away, but she didn't, and I met her eyes again to see the sadness was even more pronounced.

“I’m sorry. I’m just worried…” Hanji tapped her fingers against the wheel, pulling into the South Street Diner. It was one of her favorite all-night places to eat, tucked in Back Bay before we would go on to Cambridge. She parked, but didn’t move, and I remained in my seat to hear her out. “I can't always be there, Levi, and you need someone.” she said finally, her voice minuscule. I opened my mouth to retort, to tell her that’s exactly what I was doing by even showing up to the fucking “party,” but I couldn't. The realization that it wasn't a stupid experiment and she was genuinely worried about me was humbling.

We said goodbye outside my apartment, our stomachs full and my mood less accusatory. Hanji hadn’t gone about it the right way, but I had to forgive her. I wrapped my arms around her tightly, and it took several moments for her to respond. For a moment I thought the shock of what I was doing might have killed her, as I can count on two fingers the amount of hugs I've ever given her, but she kissed my temple and sniffled.

“Get out of my car, asshole.”

* * *

The next time I saw Eren wasn't until he came into Room 23 as scheduled. Petra was out, leaving me with the lesbian dream team and the human black hole. I had missed half of the performance thanks to Hanji's under-staffing, and I was far too sour about it.

When the crowd migrated from the counter to the floor, I leaned back behind the counter with my arms folded, curious about the addition of a second mic and a guitar. Ymir and Christa both shrugged in response to my questions. “Useless.” I told them, but they had been mostly ignoring my bad moods lately. Actually, they were far too mellow lately, but I didn't have much time to reflect on that.

I watched as Annie stepped onto stage at a gesture from Eren. She was dressed in a gray sweater that was falling down one shoulder and floral skirt, and I thought she and Eren looked rather nice together. I wondered if she was also in the band, having not bothered to really ask Eren about it, noting the silent communication going on between them. Eren picked up the acoustic while Annie pulled a violin case I hadn't noticed from behind the keyboard. She looked bored with the situation, as though she played in front of people often and it was no big deal.

_Traveling north, traveling north to find you_

_Train wheels beating, the wind in my eyes_

_Don't even know what I'll find when I get to you_

_Call out your name love, don't be surprised_

I watched intently as Annie began singing. Her voice was breathy and smooth, sultry; she wouldn’t have been out of place singing in a jazz club. It was a surprising twist to the flat voice she had spoken to me with.

Eren's gaze drifted toward me as his voice joined in, but he quickly returned to looking in the general direction of the audience. I had a feeling that, without knowing why, he had just wanted to make sure that I was paying attention.

_It's so many miles and so long since I've left you_

_Don't even know what I'll find when I get to you_

_But suddenly now, I know where I belong_

_It's many hundred miles and it won't be long_

Sasha nudged my shoulder. I turned to look at her, and she leaned down. “Look.” she whispered with a quiet giggle, gesturing quickly at Ymir and Christa.

I glanced to the side where Ymir was standing next to Christa; they were both leaning against the counter, watching the performance, but in the space between them I could see their fingers intertwined on the counter. Ymir caught my eye; she looked ready to pull her hand away from Christa, but Christa leaned her head against Ymir's shoulder and I could literally see the thought disappear from her mind as she looked down in surprise.

_Nothing at all, in my head, to say to you_

_Only the beat of the train I'm on_

_Nothing I've learned all my life on the way to you_

_One day our love was over and gone_

Annie was looking at two people in the front row as Eren sang, a tiny hint of a smile playing at her lips. I followed her gaze — Reiner and Bertl were sitting in the front row, watching her. Bertl's face was unreadable, but he looked intent; on the other hand, Reiner was grinning at her, looking proud. I couldn't imagine how three people who were so painfully different had even found common ground.

I looked back at Eren. As with the first performance, I found myself wondering where he drew the inspiration for his lyrics from. I made a mental note to ask him the next time we talked.

Armin came to the counter, looking a little nervous as I stepped forward. “Pour-over?” I asked, voice thick with sarcasm, but offering him a smile.

“Yeah, please.” he pulled out his debit card, but I waved my hand.

“On the house,” I turned to look at Sasha, who had surprised me by becoming a halfway decent barista as I trained her. “You remember how to make a pour-over?”

“Don't burn my hand?” she asked, looking concerned, causing everyone that heard her to laugh. I glared at her.

“You weren't even here for that, brat!” I spit at her, unconsciously putting my hands on my hips.

“So sassy!” Ymir snorted at me, rolling her eyes. I dropped my hands immediately.

_What will I do if there's someone there with you_

_Maybe someone you've always known_

_How do I know I can come and give to you_

_Love with no warning and find you alone_

“Heh, thanks.” Armin smiled shyly while Sasha made his drink.

“Growing them out?” I asked conversationally, indicating his bangs, which were clipped to one side.

“Um, yes. They're in that annoying stage where they're always in my face, though.” Armin laughed, looking at _me like he was unsure what was happening._

_It's so many miles and so long since I've met you_

_Don't even know what I'll find when I get to you_

_But suddenly now, I know where I belong_

_It's many hundred miles and it won't be long_

_It won't be long_

_It won't be long_

_It won't be long_

“So, your friend Eren,” I started, glancing back at the stage. Armin's brows shot up, but I did my best to ignore that. “Does he write his songs?”

“Oh. Oh, yes, he writes them all himself. Annie helped on the duet, if that's what you're wondering.” Armin took his drink from Sasha with a murmured 'thank you,' looking like he wasn't sure whether he should leave or not. I checked my watch; Eren was nearing the end of his set, which was coincidentally when my shift ended. By coincidentally, I mean that Hanji planned it that way, but I wasn't going to complain about working less hours.

“Mind if I join you?” I asked.

“Uh. No?” Armin laughed, shaking his head. “I mean, no. Sorry, I —”

“Don’t worry about it.” I came from behind the counter, walking with Armin toward the audience. We fell into an awkward silence, but it was preferable to explaining my magical ability to be less of a dick when I had the apron on.

I sat with Armin and Mikasa, who greeted me with a wave. Eren and Annie went through two more duets. Annie played guitar as well as Eren, who moved back to his keyboard after the first song. I couldn't decipher the lyrics of the last song to save my life, what with it being in German, but the two of them had a nice harmony going. I had a feeling that song was more self-indulgent than anything else, but enjoyed the intensely emotional faces Annie pulled as she sang.

There was a light scattering of applause as Eren stood, thanking people for coming. I was about to stand when I heard a voice I only vaguely recognized. “Woo! Yeah, that's my girl!” Reiner was standing, clapping louder than the rest of the shop combined. Annie was frozen in place, her face looking as though she was feeling so many different emotions at once and couldn't decide which one to express.

“Calm down, Reiner.” Eren laughed into the mic, slinging his arm around Annie, who relaxed and gave an awkward smile. I glanced at Bertl; I couldn't see his face, but I had a feeling from his unnaturally perfect posture that he was probably wishing he could disappear into the chair. I watched, amused, as Reiner pulled Annie down off the stage as if she weighed nothing, but Eren crossed in front of them and the unusual trio was pushed completely from my head.

“Levi!” Eren greeted me first, throwing an arm around my shoulder and grinning widely. He looked exhilarated, cheeks pink and eyes bright and I didn’t even consider pushing him off. He was leaning slightly, due to our height difference, his hip pushing awkwardly into my side.

“It’s nice to see you too, Eren.” Mikasa scoffed, but her eyes were kind. I extracted myself from Eren’s grip, noticing Armin looking between us.

“Hey, brat,” I greeted, confused when Eren only grinned wider. “Um. Any of you want coffee before we shut down?” I asked.

“Armin says I drink too much coffee,” Eren grumbled, giving his friend the most pathetic glare I have ever seen. When he spotted the pour-over in Armin’s hand, his mouth fell open. “Hey! Hey, if you get coffee I get coffee!” he said indignantly.

“Eren,” Armin rolled his eyes. “You drank an entire pot before you came here.”

“That’s like, half of what he normally drinks, though.” Mikasa said thoughtfully.

“Okay, no coffee for Eren, then. I’m not going to be an enabler,” I shrugged. Mikasa and Armin laughed, while Eren looked betrayed. “Mikasa? Latte?”

“No thanks, I have early classes on Friday.”

“Can I just have a small coffee, then?” Eren looked at me, half pouting, half hopeful.

“I’ll make you a drink,” I said. He looked excited, following me over to the counter. Like Armin, he was halfway to handing me his debit card when I waved my hand. “Consider it your lucky day, I get free drinks I haven’t cashed in.”

“Levi, we’re closed.” Sasha frowned. She was wiping down the counters carefully, as she had picked up really quickly on the fact that I would not accept anything less than perfectly clean. Ymir and Christa were already gone, and the register was indeed closed.

“I’ll clean up after myself.” I replied, and she knew I would. I brewed some chai tea, pulling our pumpkin base out of the refrigerator and putting a scoop in the paper cup, then mixing it with steamed milk. Tea went over the top, followed by whipped cream and cinnamon. I wasn’t sure if Eren would like it, but it would have to do for his apparent caffeine fixation.

“What is that?” Eren looked at the cup suspiciously. “Smells like … fall.”

“I wasn’t aware fall has its own smell,” I pushed the cup into his hand, re-cleaning quickly and pulling off my apron. I wasn’t interested in some of the lingering people to wander over, thinking they were going to get special treatment like Eren just had. “It’s a pumpkin chai latte.”

Eren took a drink, but immediately pulled a face as his hand seized a little on the cup. His eyes were a hair wider than normal, and he looked betrayed and disgusted and it was fucking hilarious. I laughed right in his face, realizing that when I had said “latte” he hadn’t expected tea. I could read every emotion on his face, reflected in his eyes, and god damn if I wasn’t standing there thinking how attractive he was.

 _Fuck you, Hanji_ , the words popped into the back of my head before I could stop them.

“If anyone else had given me this,” Eren coughed, hitting his chest a few times. There was a dollop of whipped cream on his nose, speckled with cinnamon. I smirked. “I would toss it. I just want you to know that.”

“Tossing a free drink? Who was the dick, again?” I tossed my apron in the general direction of the break room, heading for the side door. Eren's face colored a little, but glanced back at the stage. Bertl and Reiner were helping Annie pack up; Annie waved him on, and he grinned. “What makes me special, anyway?” I asked, pleased when he had precisely the reaction I expected; his face flushed, dark, and he spluttered as he followed me out of the door.

“Shit.” Ymir’s voice sounded to my left, and I have to say that it was probably the worst possible thing she could have done in a situation where she wanted to be unnoticed. Eren and I both paused, looking at her. She was pressed against Christa, whose back was against the wall of the shop, her polka dot bra peeking out from behind her unbuttoned shirt.

“Really? Really? I didn’t take you for fucking idiots.” I quirked a brow as Ymir scrambled to pull her own coat closed around her open shirt. I glanced at her hot pink and black lace bra, a little surprised at the femininity of it.

“Fuck off.” Ymir grumbled, buttoning her coat, but she was smiling. Widely. Obviously.

“Hey, I’m not judging,” I held up my hands in a mock-defensive pose. “But if you’re trying to be subtle, maybe make out, I dunno, in your car or something.”

“Levi.” Christa frowned at me, a facial expression that almost made me feel bad.

“What is it, small one?” I asked coolly. She laughed.

“Don’t give Ymir a hard time, I’ll make you regret it.” Christa drew herself up to her full height (which isn’t much, and that’s saying something coming from me), glaring up at me haughtily.

“Oh. Oh, that’s scary. Alright, cross my heart.” I said, doing a half salute.

“Hey, Eren.” Ymir nodded at Eren, who tilted his head.

“Hey, guys. Saw you at the show Saturday, thanks for showing up.” he grinned again, looking slightly proud as he spoke. Christa returned the smile earnestly.

“I’m out. See you guys tomorrow, probably.” I turned away to go to my car, their voices echoing behind me as I pulled my keys out of my pocket. I was looking forward to another night of wine and painting; the disaster I called a river had slowly been fixed into something that actually resembled water, a feat which took way too much paint and concentration.

“Levi!” Eren called my name, jogging over. I turned to see Ymir and Christa getting into Christa’s cheerful yellow Prius. They both waved goodbye, Christa more enthusiastically, before disappearing into the car.

“What?” I looked back at Eren. He suddenly looked shy, a strange look for him.

“Do you have class tomorrow? I mean, you mentioned modeling and I don’t have class until the afternoon so I thought since I was working on a song maybe you’d want to…” he trailed off, looking at the ground, before chancing a hopeful peek at my face.

“Want to…?” I replied, trailing off like he had in my best impression of cluelessness. It was obvious what he was getting at, but I wanted to make him work for it, at least a little.

“Paint me?” he laughed at his own words, shaking his head. “Wow, that sounds weird.”

“Yeah, I don’t remember saying I wanted to paint you.” I replied evenly. It was a blatant lie, but it made Eren look away in embarrassment.

“Well, okay, I just thought…” he paused, then glared. “You did too!”

“Idiot,” I laughed, shaking my head. “Sure. How loud is your keyboard?”

“I can keep it quiet... though I’m not good at keeping my voice down?”

“Turn it up to 11. My neighbor likes to vacuum at 2:45 in the morning on the dot.”

I leaned against my car, finishing the latte I had made for Eren while he coordinated with his friends. He was especially careful about packing his equipment into the back seat of his car. His guitar was so firmly wedged between the driver and back seat that it wouldn't have fallen over if he started driving in figure eights. It seemed a little counter-intuitive, because if he had to make a sudden stop and was jerked back against the seat I had a feeling the guitar would be toast.

Instead of mentioning that, I read the news on my phone without paying much attention to Eren or his friends. He had decided to only bring along his keyboard, and it was in the trunk while they took half an hour to move everything and coordinate rides and decide for me that I would bring Eren back to the coffee shop to get his car. I had no earthly idea how it could possibly take so long to figure out a few simple details; I hoped the long glares I had started sending Eren’s way would be enough of a hint to hurry up before my patience dwindled beyond the charade it already was.

The news only made me more irritated; it was very much a 'same shit, different day' situation. There seemed to be a very strict set of rules for what would make the front page:

  * Mr. President disappointed us again
  * Unrest in some part of the world
  * Religious leader said this
  * People outraged over something
  * Celebrity A is going to _____ Celebrity B and we should all care
  * Someone in the country is crazy and here's proof
  * Reasons you should be afraid of something (everything)



“Ready?” Eren gave me a lopsided smile, leaning against the passenger door with his arms over the roof. I let out an annoyed breath, the night having hit such a cold temperature that it was visible in the air. I wasn't sorry to look away from my phone, or the shit that passed as news, though.

“Am _I_ ready? Shit, let me think…” I stroked my imaginary beard, then opened the door and slid behind the wheel. Eren’s laughter was loud enough that I could hear it even when I closed the door.

The drive was quiet; Eren spent most of his time scribbling in his notebook, only looking up to glance out the window occasionally. I wondered if he was being quiet because he was lost in thought, or maybe if it was because he had picked up on the fact that I liked quiet. I wasn’t sure that was the case, since being a barista forces me to know how to talk to people, even if only kind of.

“Nice place.” Eren looked around my apartment when I let him in. He took his shoes off by the door, which I would have hugged him for if I was more touchy-feely.

“Got lucky,” I nodded, memories from the night before popping up. _No_ , _no_ , _not that song_ , I mentally grumbled. I went to the fridge, pulling out the remainder of the sangria Hanji had brought a week ago. There were four bottles left, which meant I hadn't drunk as much as I thought I had. “Wine?”

“Not yet,” Eren was setting up his keyboard in the middle of the floor. I scooted the coffee table toward the wall so that he could sit closer to the couch, and he shot me a grin of thanks. “I want to make some progress.”

I set up an easel so that I could see his face, preferring to work at the 3/4 angle when doing life drawing. I knew it wasn't a good habit, but I liked it better than straight-on and it showed more face than profile. Eren was already tinkering on his keyboard, playing warm-ups and humming an indecipherable tune. His mouth hung open slightly, his eyebrows narrowed in concentration; it was a good look for him.

“Black bird has died... red bird is on the rise...” he sang it a few different ways, before settling into a melody that he liked. I was busy sketching with charcoal, trying to capture the subtle changes in his body language and his face. It would change from scrunched up to relaxed while he sang random lyrics, scratching them out in his notebook and reforming them to his liking.

“Take off your shirt.” I instructed. I was sitting behind him at this point, painting with acrylics on paper rather than canvas. Eren turned to look at me, expression suddenly nervous.

“Uh, what?” he replied, eyes darting between my face and the paper he couldn't see.

“Take off your shirt.” I repeated, slowly. Eren still looked a little disbelieving; a sense of deja vu was beginning to creep up on me, but he shrugged suddenly, peeling off his shirt and tossing it on the couch.

“I'll have some of that wine now, if the offer is still on the table.” he mumbled, not turning to face me. I remained where I was, painting the subtle protrusion of his shoulder blade.

“Help yourself.” I replied. In my peripheral vision I saw Eren stand. He was lankier than I had expected, not muscular like Erwin, but toned. He had the slightest pudge above the waistband of his boxers, which I found oddly cute. He went into the kitchen, pulling a bottle out, then sauntering back into the room.

“Like what you see?” Eren teased me as he walked back from the kitchen. I could tell he felt uncomfortable, and he was trying to lighten his own tension more than anything else, but that line is so cliché and fucking awful that I couldn't bring myself to help him along.

“I do.” I replied shortly, my eyes moving from his chest to his navel, noticing that he had a dark patch of hair just above his belt buckle. He looked alarmed at my response, sitting down on his stool too quickly. “Don't ask if you don't want an answer, Eren.” I laughed, placing my wet paper on the coffee table.

“Sorry,” Eren said, shrugging. “I just didn't expect a yes from someone more attractive than me?” he laughed awkwardly, almost all of the awkwardness from a moment ago gone.

Rather than say anything, I moved my easel directly beside him, pulling my chair close and shrugging. “Life is full of surprises, kid.” I replied, mostly to avoid the pathetic self-deprecation that was on the tip of my tongue. It was a bad habit that seemed enormously insecure, which I tend not to be.

“Kid.” Eren repeated, a touch of irritation in his voice, but he didn't say anything. He resumed playing piano, a different piece than he had been working on for most of the night. This one seemed mostly finished; the piano seemed just as melancholy as the previous songs I had heard, but it was similarly intense.

 _Intense_. It was a word that came up often when I thought of Eren, whether it was his voice, his music, or his eyes. I painted in short, quick strokes against the paper, shading with plum and burgundy, trying to capture each dip and curve as precisely as I could. His shoulder was a nice, sharp outline, skin paler than that of his arms, with a few freckles here and there. Not like the eye patch kid had freckles; his looked more like they had come from days spent in the sun.

I washed the plum from my brush, mixing a chocolate color to paint in his hair. It had soft hints of auburn and thin wisps of golden brown and copper, again making me think he spent a lot of time in the sun. He was singing, quietly, but just loud enough that I could pull the vocal melody from the piano.

My brush halted on my palette as I paused to listen to Eren sing. His voice sounded subtly different not coming out of a sound system, clearer and smoother. It changed easily from brittle to husky to strong, holding me enthralled, listening for the subtle differences, the changes in pitch, the way he would stretch out his vowels and cut off harshly on consonants.

He fell quiet, his fingers slowed their pace, and then there was quiet. I still hadn't moved from my position; I was looking at my half finished painting, my brush held against my palette with my thumb. Quietly, I placed my brush on the easel, the palette on the coffee table. I had every intention of getting up for a glass of water, but Eren turned at the sound of me putting down my tools. His eyes burned with the same fire they had when he left the stage, and my explanation that I was just getting a drink died in my throat.

I averted my eyes, looking at his lips, then his chin, following his jaw to the curve in his neck as it led into his spine. “What'd you think? Annie wrote some suggestions in my book but I like the way I wrote it better.”

“I liked it. It was good. Really good.” I answered honestly. Eren turned back to his keyboard, lifting his book out of his lap and flipping through the pages until he found the one he was looking for. There was a tiny bear/monster thing doodled in the corner, along with some slanted, thin scrawl I couldn't read.

 _Drink_ , I reminded myself. I stood, scooting my stool aside with my foot, but I didn't move. Eren was absorbed in the lyrics he was reading, humming to himself energetically. I placed my hands on his shoulders, struck by how warm he was, knowing that my fingers must be freezing. He jumped a little, then twisted around to look at me. “What's up? Do you want me to pose?”

“You're too tall...” I muttered. Eren laughed, and I could hear the questioning inflection of his laugh. I didn't have alcohol to use as an excuse, but I remembered later that blaming my actions on alcohol was repugnant anyway.

“Levi, what —”

Eren went abruptly silent as I leaned in to press my lips against his. I was alarmed at my own behavior, but the second I realized that Eren responded with absolutely zero hesitation I was gone. I leaned into him, tangling my fingers in his hair. One of us moaned, and I could taste sweet wine as Eren pressed his tongue against mine. It was hesitant and I barely had time to register that he was taking the lead anyway when his fingers were grasping my hips, pulling me against him.

I leaned my head away, looking down at Eren, who pulled in a shaky breath. He stood, pushing my head back so that I was looking up at him, telling me he very much understood my comment about his height. I shivered as he brushed the back of his hand up my cheekbone, pushing my hair out of my eyes. The second kiss was rough, hungry, making me stumble back against the wall out of surprise. I whimpered into his open mouth as he pinned me, tongue assaulting mine, pulling at my shirt until it was discarded and I could feel his heat against my bare skin.

I had been in this position before, and had never enjoyed it. The first signs of panic were creeping their way in, but I was so focused on Eren's hands on my back, my sides, at my hips. His lips were on my neck, and then his teeth, and I whimpered at the fervency he came at me with. I whispered his name, then moaned it as he pressed his thigh between my legs, blood suddenly rushing to my cock.

“Wait,” I said, scrambling down from his grip. He let go only after I was steadily on my feet, taking a step backward and looking at me. He was breathing heavily, looking at me hungrily, but the panic was going to take hold and I had to explain myself before I freaked out. “Can you call someone? I need you to leave.”

It sounded horrible. Eren's face fell flat, and I shook my head, wanting to make sure he understood. “Yeah, I can call Mikasa. You're obviously not alright, and honestly I kinda want to know what the fuck just happened, but you're not alright and I don't understand why so if you want to tell me now is a good time.” he said the words in a rush, and I recognized that he wanted to be pissed and maybe he was.

“I can't give you the explanation you need,” I said the words as evenly as I could, picking up my shirt and pulling it back on as a way to shield myself. I felt stark naked, exposed, and my legs were starting to shake. “You didn't do anything. It's not you. I know that's fucking stupid, fucking cliché as fuck but _it's not you_ , and if you want to know me you need to understand that.”

Eren looked bewildered. “Know you? I thought...” he looked away, embarrassed, and I realized with sudden finality that he had just been interested in a fuck. I swallowed.

“Just... call your sister, okay?” I said, quietly, my tone sounding robotic even to my own ears. I had to give Eren credit; he didn't approach me, or try to “talk sense” into me, or argue against leaving. He picked up his shirt, pulling it over his head, mussing his already tousled hair. His keyboard was packed up quickly. I excused myself to the bathroom, which made Eren's brow furrow, but he didn't say anything.

I sat on the sink, taking an Ativan out of the orange bottle it came in. It was pretty much full; I didn't like to take medication unless I had to, but being away from Eren was already causing the anxiety to ebb away. I sighed bitterly, tossing the pill back in the bottle. I could hear Eren calling Mikasa, arguing with her, but he didn't blame me. He didn't say I was fucking weird, or that I had suddenly flipped out, just repeated that he needed her to come pick him up.

I didn't leave the bathroom until I heard a horn honking outside. Eren was looking at my painting of him in wonder, but looked nervous when he heard my footsteps.

“Are we still going to be friends tomorrow?” he asked. He looked so like a little kid that I could barely suppress my smile.

“Don't be dumb, Eren,” I said, glad to hear I at least managed to tease him slightly. “You were doing so well.”

“I have no idea what you mean by that,” he said honestly. I shrugged in response. “See you Tuesday, then.”

I dropped down to the couch as my door closed, recognizing the unspoken statement that he wasn't going to see me beforehand. I leaned back against the cushions, feeling oddly weak, but relieved.

It wasn't until I woke up the next morning that I realized Eren had taking my painting off the easel.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry. :( Levi has his reasons. I'll elaborate, but it'll be trigger-y, so I have to approach it carefully, obviously.


	7. Off-kilter

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Eren sleeps over, Levi is treated to breakfast, Hanji shows up to make his day.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I feel like I should clarify, this chapter leaves out some details intentionally. It's supposed to feel strange and make you question what's happening. There's going to be explanations in the next chapter, but right now Levi is caught between focuses and not considering his actions. I hope that helps.
> 
> I'm trying to sketch tattoos out but I find them hard, so it'll take some time. Levi's got the wings of freedom, of course, and some other things that I'm trying to make look good together. I've always seen Levi with tattoos, but I haven't mentioned them yet because they didn't seem relevant.
> 
> Aaaand I hope the smut is decent. TW dicks.

I would have had to eat my words, as it were, if I had spoken them. It was a Sunday, the 27th. Fall was disappearing into winter, the breezes becoming unbearable to stand in, leaves crunching every step of the way on my morning runs.

I was lying awake in bed, as I often do when I wake up before the sun sets. I was warm, peaceful, and somewhat immobilized by strong, tanned arms around my waist. Eren breathed quietly in my ear, his breath ghosting over my jaw, ruffling my hair. He had been snoring lightly before, and when I felt haphazard kisses on my shoulder, I turned to look at him.

“Hey.” Eren said, quietly. He was smiling, his eyes heavy lidded with sleep, looking at me like he was both confused and glad to find me still next to him.

“Go to sleep.” I replied, resting my hands over his, clasped on my stomach. Eren laughed, nuzzling his face into the crook of my neck.

“You go to sleep.” I pushed Eren's face back with my shoulder while he giggled.

“I shouldn't even dignify you with a response sometimes, fuck.” I leaned back into him, pausing awkwardly when I felt something nudging into me. Hanji had taken to referring to this as “the boner shark,” something about some web comic and “it's funny, you just have a shitty sense of humor.”

I actually gave her bonus points for the double meaning.

“Eheh...” Eren shifted positions, and I whined at the loss of warmth and rolled with him.

“It's a fucking boner, get over it, damn brat.” I grumbled, looking at his face and being satisfied that it was a little pink. “Shit, what time is it?”

“Uhhhhm....” Eren picked up his phone, the screen illuminating my pocket loft. “4:43. We should go back to bed.”

“Once I'm up, I'm up.” I shrugged, but I didn't move to get to the kitchen. There were 100 things I could do other than lie in bed with Eren Jaeger, like two fucking little teenagers who still gasped and covered their mouths at the mention of sex. Which we hadn't had, by the way. It's the kind of thing you would expect with two people spooning in the same bed, both in boxers and trading discount sweet nothings.

“Nooo,” Eren pulled me tightly against him, wrapping his legs around mine. “You can't take sleep away from me, I drink enough coffee as it is,” he laughed with the faintest little whine. I grinned in spite of myself, and he blinked at me in surprise. “That's weird, Levi.”

I glared at him, pushing my lips into a straight line and turning away. “That's just the way it is.”

“Aw, I was kidding,” Eren let go of me, turning away to lie on his back. I did the same, propping myself on my elbows and looking at him. “So, are you going to the art school across the river?”

“Which?” I raised a brow at him.

“You know, _the art school_.” he replied, waving a hand around as though that would explain things.

“I go to BU.”

“BU? Are you serious?” he asked, a wrinkle between his brows. I wasn't sure what he meant by it, so I waited for him to elaborate. “Shouldn't you be like, in New York City with a little loft apartment, smoking cigarettes and selling paintings?”

“Smoking cigarettes?” I gave him an incredulous look; I honestly couldn't believe he would suggest it after having been around me in my apartment. “I'm in political science. So then, how's the music program treating you? Isn't there somewhere better for that than BU?”

Eren looked confused at the shift in conversation, then frowned. “I'm not going for music. I'm in computer science.” he said after a moment.

“Didn't see that one coming.” I commented, not really sure what to say about that.

“Annie went to Juilliard, though. I mean, she was going to.”

“Going to? What does that mean, like she wanted to and didn't get in?”

“No,” Eren shook his head, the wrinkle still between his brows. “I mean, she got in. She just came back is all, about two months in? She's been living with us ever since. That's around the time we got wind of the whole m _énage à trois_ thing, kind of a big bomb to drop? I think Mikasa kinda liked Annie.”

“Forget that,” I sat up more fully, aware that I was probably looking a little inappropriately incredulous. “She got into Juilliard and then fucking left? _She fucking left_?”

“Well, yeah?” Eren made a cautious face, and when I heard what he said next I realized it was because he wasn't sure if he was over sharing or not. “She never really wanted to be that serious about music. She's into the band because Reiner and Bertl are, and I mean she loves music, I guess she just didn't want to be serious about it in that way?” he paused, thinking that over, then nodded. “She just wants to do her own thing and enjoy it, but her home life was kind of fucked up — her dad was really fucked up, actually. They told her if she left Juilliard she would be disowned, but she says she didn't even think twice about coming back.”

“Wow.” I tried to imagine turning Harvard down, saying goodbye to the life I was set on attaining, and my insides seemed to freeze. That was the difference, though. I was set on Harvard, and she wasn't set on Juilliard, apparently. I felt a shred more respect for Annie; I had always loved painting, and for a long time I had loved only painting. The idea of trying to pursue it as a career, though, was ludicrous to me. There was a lot of value in safety.

Eren hummed in response. He was tracing his fingers over my side, softly, almost tickling, but far too light even for that. “I didn't expect someone like you to be so heavily tattooed.” he said, following the outline of stag antlers toward my spine.

“Everyone needs a little glaring contradiction in their life.” I shivered involuntarily as Eren's fingers trailed down my spine, near the waistband of my boxers, then back up.

“You're so tiny.” Eren remarked offhandedly. I wasn't sure why exactly he was informing me that I'm small; the fact that most guys (and people in general) managed to break 5'3” wasn't exactly secret information. I chose not to reply, having never been self-conscious, per se. Okay, that's a complete lie, my height plagued my insecurities until I realized I really kind of enjoyed being picked up and held and manipulated like a little marionette. Maybe it's a little weird to get off on, but I could never really help it.

“Are you getting at something?” I asked, feigning irritability. Eren's fingers paused when they snaked around my side. The next thing I knew, he had wrapped his arms around my chest and pulled me down to lie awkwardly on top of him. “Oi!” I twisted, getting myself stuck under the crook of his elbow, and opted to glare at him. “What do you —”

My words were abruptly cut off as I felt Eren's fingers slide under the elastic band of my boxers. I stiffened slightly, holding my breath. We hadn't discussed what had happened on Tuesday, and I was halfway to putting a stop to whatever it was Eren planned when he spoke. “Tell me to stop any time.” I relaxed at those words. They were words that I wasn't familiar with, but words I appreciated more deeply than I could have imagined.

“Fine, but this is really uncomfortable. Sit up, or something.” I mumbled, still turning his words over in my head. Eren did exactly as I asked; I slid down to sit on the mattress between his long legs, leaned back with him against the wall. His breath was warm on the nape of my neck as he kissed a trail across my shoulder, his fingers curling around my already half-hard cock.

I drew in my last even breath, leaning into Eren fully and tilting my head back. His lips were on my neck, below my ear, then his teeth, and I had to bite my tongue to keep from making any noise. “I saw that.” Eren murmured in my ear. I tried to glare wordlessly, but the feel of his hand pulled a quiet moan from me.

“Don't … don't look so pleased with yourself.” I said through uneven breaths. It had been a long time since I'd been touched, or even touched myself. I'd sort of forgotten how good a hand job could feel. His strokes were slow and deliberate, a little maddeningly so. I lifted my hips impatiently, but Eren pulled me back with his free hand and a chuckle.

“And I thought you were the patient type,” he teased; he rested his chin on my shoulder, leaned his head against mine as he pulled my underwear away, leaving me exposed. I could feel his eyes on me, watching me writhe under his touches. “Listen to you,” he went on after I let out a particularly loud moan. His voice was low, rough. “A little eager, are we?”

I bit my lip, using all of my concentration to keep my hips still on the mattress. “You fucking think?” I hissed at him, chancing a glance down. Eren's fingers were slick with precum, sliding easily over the sensitive skin. My stomach was tight, almost uncomfortably so, but... I was fine. I wasn't going to panic, not like last time; he had laid it out up front that I could stop him whenever I needed to. I had control.

“Shut up.” Eren replied, firmly, with authority. He laced his fingers in my hair, then forced my face sideways to look at him. His eyes were dark, and I was transfixed at the sight of him, the feel of him.

I nodded, biting my tongue to keep from making a sarcastic remark. I can't say I was really expecting Eren to be the dominant type, but the confidence in his voice was fitting, the command in his eyes enough to make me come apart. I realized suddenly that I was moving my hips in time with his strokes, and that I could hear my breathing coming out with soft whines. The tension in my body increased, shit, I was close. “Tell me what you want.” Eren murmured, but I merely moaned in response. He slowed his strokes.

“I want to come.” I whispered, closing my eyes, feeling my cheeks burn. Like a fucking virgin.

"You want to what?" Eren asked. "Look at me and tell me again."

It was an effort to open my eyes. I saw his face, blurred through my lashes, focused on me intently. God, he was fucking perfect, and even without the friction I needed I still felt on the verge. "I want to come, Eren," I said as firmly as I could, but my voice was still quiet, wavering. “Please.” I added, and that got the reaction I needed.

I felt my toes curl into the mattress, my fingers into Eren's thighs as he resumed jerking me off. The tension had barely ebbed when it surged back; I felt like a coil stretched taut, and my mouth was open in a silent moan. Eren covered my mouth with his, a rough and hungry kiss, before pulling away. “Come.” he ordered it, and I felt his fingers on my chin, forcing me to keep eye contact as I did exactly as he had demanded, a strange mixture of a cry and a moan forcing itself out. My eyes fell closed, my muscles relaxed slowly, and then all at once; Eren was supporting my weight, his hand still on my cock, which throbbed a little painfully.

The next thing I felt was soft kisses along my cheek and temple. I wasn't paying attention to much of anything, really. I wasn't concerned with making coffee, my mornign jog, or what Eren was doing to clean me off. I felt fucking blissful and it was hard to try wrapping my mind around anything else. I slipped my hand behind my back, to return the favor as it were, but Eren took hold of my hand and pulled it away. I opened my eyes to see his face, but he was gentle and I understood without him saying anything.

“Next time.” I agreed with his unspoken statement. I realized, before I fell asleep, that I'd never been recieved anything like that without being expected to give in return. I liked that.

\- - - - -

I woke up for the second time to the smell of bacon, and my stomach rumbled angrily. I picked up my phone, which read 7:34 AM. I nearly fell back into the comfort of my pillows when I heard Eren's voice, singing softly, floating from the kitchen. _Oh yeah_ , I thought, a little amused at how I could forget that I'd been in bed with Eren, both figuratively and literally.

I climbed down the ladder, padding into the kitchen. Eren was placing an egg scramble on my plate that looked positively awful but smelled heavenly. “Where'd you get bacon?”

“The store?” Eren replied, as if I'd asked the most oblivious question in the world.

“You walked to the store so you could make me breakfast?” I raised a brow, going to my fridge, which was usually empty _ish_. There was a carton of eggs, orange juice, milk, and a small variety of meat and vegetables. I didn't bother to protest in honor of my casual vegetarianism; the bacon smelled fucking delicious and there was no way I was going to pass on it.

I noticed that there were far more groceries than he could have just intended to be for breakfast, but I didn't comment on it. If he wanted to invite himself over and cook for me, I was fine with that. I hate cooking.

“I walked to the store so I don't starve to death before class,” Eren retorted, but stooped to kiss me as he walked by to put plates on the coffee table. It was set with a glass of water and juice for each of us, shredded cheese, salsa, and sour cream in the middle. I hadn't considered myself easy to impress until this moment, or maybe Eren had just done something I hadn't realized was impressive. “But if that's what you want to think, by all means.”

“Tch,” I followed him and sat down on the couch, helping myself to cheese and salsa, then dumping sour cream on top. “If you didn't remember tortillas I'm breaking up with you.”

“ _Tch_ ,” Eren imitated me, picking up a plate with a stack of tortillas from my workspace. He dropped down on the couch next to me, taking a tortilla for himself. I watched with equal parts interest and disgust as he used the tortilla in lieu of a fork, scooping food into his mouth and pulling in the tortilla after. “What? Edible fork.” I shook my head rather than respond, tucking into the food Eren had made. He made his bacon crisp rather than chewy, and I knew right then he was a keeper.

I was aware that Eren was watching me as I finished my scramble. “Mandarin?” he asked, holding out a small orange.

“Let me eat my tortilla first.” I replied, taking one, placing it on my plate, and cutting it into strips. Eren laughed while I ate it, though I couldn't figure out why.

“Are you always so methodical when you eat?” Eren asked. He was peeling his own mandarin, juice running down his fingers. I saw dark spots on my couch and nearly kicked Eren off of it.

"Yes." I replied shortly. It wasn't as weird of a habit as I could have had, but it had been deemed amusing by a lot of people.

We spent most of the morning lazing around on the couch; Eren skipped his Monday classes in favor of spending time with me, but I refused to miss my own. He pouted darkly as he gathered up his belongings, which had scattered an amazing amount around my apartment for having been there less than 24 hours. I shooed him out the door as I left, locking up. The day was dreary and cold, and I regretted that I had to leave my apartment at all.

I dropped Eren off at his house before heading to class. We sat awkwardly in his car; I wasn't sure if I should kiss him goodbye or just act normal.

“So... are we a couple?” he asked. His voice was small and unsure. I tapped my fingers on the steering wheel, not sure how to answer. Did giving someone a hand job count as anything more than a hand job? Or was it the "breaking up" comment I'd made earlier?

“I don't know,” I replied finally. Eren nodded at that, his expression unchanging. “No.” I added, a little more firmly. He nodded again.

“I kinda figured that.” he laughed, leaning over to kiss my cheek. I turned to face him without thinking about it, our lips meeting in an awkward kiss. I tried to push the night before out of my mind. Sitting in a car wasn't my ideal location for a boner.

“I hope...” I started as he leaned away. I changed course, unsure of how to finish that statement. “Maybe we'll get there.”

“Okay. That's fair,” he grinned, giving me another peck. “I hope so too!”

I sat in front of his house even as he disappeared, the familiar feeling of dread in my stomach. I wasn't sure if what had just transpired was really the best idea; I have a much more firm history of pushing people away due to my oddities than I do of being close with them. My work relationships, my relationship with my parents, and even to some degree Erwin, were superficial. I trusted Erwin, which was more than I could say for most, except for Hanji. It wasn't really a matter of me seeking friendship with her as it was her deciding I was her friend and that's how it was. Maybe that was how people had to approach me. It was working for Eren so far.

Classes passed in a blur that day. I took notes that wound up being worthless, and barely managed to finish the paper that was due the next day. I spent most of the day in the library, absorbed in books and then the computer and then books again when Google decided to be as useful as the dirt on my shoes. It was 9 PM before I decided to wrap it up and make my way out. Eren had sent me a text asking if I'd be at his show the next day, to which I'd replied (truthfully) that I wasn't working. A second text later had been some rambling about a Halloween party, which I had never responded to. I was too absorbed in school work to start thinking of a party.

I frowned when I remembered that Hanji had already planned our Halloween costumes, and was very likely in the process of creating them. I'd told her, at some point, that I didn't fucking care.

“ _Levi, Leviiiii,” she'd said over her fifth margarita. “I just want to make you something you like!”_

“ _Sew me a fucking dress for all I care, Hanji, I've got other things to worry about.” I replied. I was immersed in a painting, though I should have been immersed in my schoolwork. The TV was on in the background, and I was trying my hardest not to listen to the inane ramblings of The Next Generation. I still have no idea how Hanji managed to find that show no matter what time of the day it was. Maybe there was a dedicated Star Trek channel I didn't know about._

I walked out of my library looking at my phone. I ignored the cheerful “Have a good one!” from the guy at the desk, who was wearing those ridiculous Buddy Holly glasses and a BU hoodie. There was something off about my day, and I decided to go for a jog once I got home. It didn't fix things, really, but it made them better. It also made seeing Hanji's face outside my door a little more tolerable.

“I'm not fucking coming in tomorrow.” I greeted her, catching my breath. She held up her hands in front of her, which I knew she thought made her look non-threatening.

“I just came by to drop off your costume.” she said, my loud groan nearly drowning out the end of her sentence. I noticed the garment bag on the door handle, and a basket in her hands.

“Fine, come in.” I grumbled, opening the door and going into my thankfully warm apartment. “How do you even get in here? There's a gate, you know.”

“I climb it?” she replied, bringing in the basket and the bag. I could see layers of rainbow tulle poking out of the bottom of the garment bag, and I knew, as I should have known when I said it, that Hanji had sewn me a dress. I didn't really blame her, because I definitely had told her to go right ahead. Sometimes I irritated myself.

“Of course you do,” I watched as Hanji pulled out a fucking tutu, a dress, gloves, a hat... wings? _Wings_. “So am _I_ on ecstasy, or is everyone around me supposed to think _they_ are?”

Hanji snorted in response, placing a wig carefully on a stand. The costume was such a random mishmash of colors my eyes burned just looking at them. “You can't show up to a costume party without a costume. And, your welcome, I made you an awesome costume.”

“Since when am I going to a costume party?” I raised a brow at her as she sat a pair of pastel blue boot shoe things in front of me. They had a large heel that I was almost sure could be considered a murder weapon.

“Try those on!” she said, tossing the box they came in aside. I felt my eye twitch. “And you're going to one. With me. Check your phone occasionally, yeah?”

I pulled out my phone, noticing that I had a new group text with several numbers I didn't recognize, as well as Christa, Ymir, Hanji, and Sasha. It was the same one that I had ignored as I left the library. “Really?” I tossed my phone on the couch, grabbing the shoes to avoid grabbing Hanji's neck. Unsurprisingly, they were a perfect fit. Hanji pulled me to my feet immediately, and I wobbled dangerously, grabbing her arms.

“Ooh, you're so tall!” she exclaimed gleefully, clapping her hands together and looking rather as she usually did when discovering something new to talk about on her podcast or concluding an experiment.

“Va chier, Hanji, _va chier_.” I snapped, letting go of her arms and taking a few careful steps. My ankles were in danger of snapping at how unsteady my feet were.

“Baby's first heels,” she sighed wistfully, taking out her own, completely reasonable glittery flats, which were almost identical to mine in color. “We're going to be twinsies!” she added. It was honestly as though she had no idea how close I was to beating her to death with the shoes she had brought me.

“What's this?” I asked, picking up the basket. There was still fabric in there, and I pulled out a pair of very tall socks that looked to at least be warm.

“Oh, some stuff.” Hanji said evasively, changing into her regular shoes and heading for the door. “Don't worry, you don't owe me for any of this. It'll be worth it to see you in costume.”

“Oi, Hanji,” I was still digging through the bag. “What makes you think I'm going to wear this?”

“Because I paid for it, made most of it, and _you love me_.” she replied. The door was open. I had the distinct feeling she was trying to disappear as quickly as possible.

“Try again.” I picked up a small wad of pink fabric. “Hanji...” I held them up with two fingers, trying to figure out how one tiny garment could be satiny, lacy, sheer, and have ribbons all at once. “I think you forgot someth —”

The door clicked, right about the same time that it clicked in my head that I wasn't actually holding my friend's panties. It was easier to realize that than to realize that I was holding panties that were now _mine_.

My phone vibrated, and I went to the sofa to pick it up, still pinching the abomination between my fingers. The text was part of the group chat, from Eren.

_Wear a costume, Levi!_

I looked at the text for a few minutes, before simply sending: _You won't even recognize me_.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I deliberately left out the lyric/list combo, because I feel like it makes the chapter feel a little off, which is supposed to be a reflection of Levi's feelings at the moment.
> 
> I proofread this several times, hopefully I caught mistakes.
> 
> Um, hope you enjoyed. ;;;;;;;;;;;


	8. I Don't Know

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A brief glimpse into Levi's head, important conversations, Levi being subject to Hanji's clothing whims.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TW: mental health issues, reference to drugs. Throwing that out there.
> 
> Hopefully this clears up what was happening in the last chapter.
> 
> Thanks for the encouragement here/on Tumblr. I was halfway to not writing ever again but sigh, I like this story too much. I seriously haven't tried to write a fic in years, and suddenly I'm this dedicated writer. It's weird.
> 
> PS you can find me at ghosts-desu.tumblr.com

_Someone didn't show tonight! :(_

I looked up from my paper to read the text I had received from Eren. Irritably, I tossed my phone in the general direction of the loft. It clattered against the wall and fell in pieces on the floor, but I didn't move to pick it up. I had spent the past day and a half in a funk I couldn't get out of, and throwing myself into my neglected schoolwork wasn't helping.

Productivity always helps me. It's calming, it's a means to an end that I want, it always fucking helps. I dropped my pen to the coffee table, flexing my fingers. They were unusually rough looking; I had bitten my nails off, and then attacked the skin around them before I was able to relax into the couch and move on with my homework. Two papers and fuck tons of research later, I was out of shit to do, angry at Hanji, angry at Eren, angry in general. I wanted to go for a jog, but my stomach was growling and I hadn't showered since Monday morning.

The new Arcade Fire album played loudly in the background, each noise and lyric piercing into me, and endless barrage of imaginary needles. I didn't feel like getting off the couch to turn it off, didn't feel like staying on the couch and letting the album I had looked forward to the most this year piss me off. I got reluctantly to my feet, going to the kitchen for something to eat. There was a nice looking salad and a mason jar of dressing I hadn't noticed the day before, along with the meat and vegetables I was sure were going to go bad. I had no intention of cooking them, no intention of letting Eren in my apartment ever again, and their entire fucking existence in my fridge was another pinprick in my brain.

“ _Tabarnak_!” I cursed, loudly. My voice was rough from disuse and had a feral quality to it that I hadn't heard from myself in a long time. Fucking  _Eren_ , coming into my apartment, buying me food to eat, holding me while I slept, getting me off, treating me special. The memory of it should have been pleasant, but I felt anxiety clawing at my ribcage, heard it like nails on a chalkboard. I sat on the cold tile floor, leaning my head against a cabinet, my arms drawn instinctively around myself. The Ativan in the bathroom was calling me, but my stubbornness was stronger. I breathed in shakily, exhaling a stream of curses when a knock sounded on my door.

It was loud, it was urgent. I knew it would be Eren, and I would set everything straight. I'd tell him to fuck off, I'd tell him he wasn't welcome, and I pulled open the door in a fast swing that caught Hanji completely off guard.

“I called you eight times!” she exclaimed, looking offended. I glared in response. “You texted me this morning that you were going to be at the shop!”

“I said I wasn't coming in!” I spat back at her, my anxiety and my frustration dangerously close to bubbling over. Hanji looked even more taken aback, but stood her ground.

“You said you were going to see Eren, and then you didn't show. Fuck, Levi, have you  _slept_  lately?”

“Slept?  _Slept_?” I laughed. My voice was high and cold and I didn't like it, but I kept going. “Who do you think you're talking to? Of course I haven't slept!”

“Levi,” Hanji's tone was firm, but it wasn't angry. I stayed in the doorway, bringing the door shut so that she would have to push me to squeeze in, and I saw the thought flicker in her eyes momentarily. I didn't deserve what she was giving me at the moment, and of course that meant I was going to throw it in her face the first opportunity I got. “What happened? What's got you wound up?”

“Only your fucking  _plan_ ,” my voice was rising, blood thundering in my ears. She didn't deserve this. She didn't do anything. I knew it, I fucking knew it. “Thanks for your help! I'm fixed now!”

Hanji's face was stony, her mouth a flat line. “Alright, Levi. First of all, fuck you,” I stepped down onto the small landing outside my door, toward her. Hanji took a step back to let me, but her eyes didn't leave my face. She didn't flinch away or look concerned at all. “Second of all, you're a grown man and if you let some kid in your bed, that was your decision. You told me to leave it alone, I left it alone.”

“Leave, Hanji,” I said before she could continue. I had a temporary moment of clarity. “You need to leave.”

It was the second time I was forcing someone out of my apartment, and I suddenly felt like I was going to vomit. I took several deep breaths while Hanji looked at me silently; her face was less angry, but I knew that look. I knew it from my parents; I knew it from friends who had left me behind. She was at the end of her rope with me, she didn't want to be, but she  _was_.

“I'll leave if you take an Ativan.” Hanji replied calmly. She grabbed my arm, firmly, and steered me back into my apartment. I caught my neighbor peeking out her screen door at the commotion. I wanted to argue with Hanji about taking any medication, but my mouth tasted like ashes and my legs were unsteady.

Hanji deposited me on the couch. I heard the sound of her putting my phone back together, the sound of the bathroom door and the pill bottle and the water running all along with the sound of music. I curled up on the couch, making myself into the tightest tangle of limbs I could, pressing my face into my arms to block out the light. Footsteps sounded across the floor, and Hanji's weight joined mine on the couch. She draped an arm around my shoulder that I shrugged off.

“The sooner you take the pill, the sooner I leave.” she said flatly. I turned my head to look at her with one eye. Hanji had an incredible amount of patience that I had never possessed, and I had no fucking clue what made her want to exercise it on me.

Without saying anything else, Hanji held out her hand. I took the pill from her, then sighed and swallowed it without water. It didn't matter if I drank or didn't drink, my body still hated the feeling of swallowing pills. They made the muscles from my neck to my stomach seize, made me feel like I was going to be ill. I gagged a little as I put my head back to my arms.

“Do you want to talk about it?”

I laughed, hollowly, but let the silence stretch between us. I had a feeling she was hanging around to make sure I slept rather than tried to throw up the pill, but I felt drained. My urge to rebel against my logic had faded as Hanji had brought me inside. The discomfort of realizing that I had been fully willing to lose my shit at someone who had dropped by to make sure I was okay was settling on me, but Hanji was humming absently and tapping her foot on the floor.

“I have a feeling I'll be talking about it eventually.” I said finally, dropping my feet to the floor and leaning against Hanji. She leaned her head on mine, and I had a ridiculous urge to curl up in her lap to sleep. I knew she would let me, but that would only add a level of complication to what I was feeling. Even if Hanji and I didn't have feelings for each other (and we never had), I knew that Hanji and I could settle down together and live a happy domestic life. We had joked about it over bottles of wine; she was asexual and I was gay, so it worked out in its own weird way.

“You're going to see him again?” she asked, keeping her voice neutral. I knew she would never let me settle into a platonic partnership with her, wouldn't ever be satisfied letting me run from my demons in a way that I couldn't find fulfillment. It was drunk talk, plain and simple.

“Have to, don't I?” I shrugged.

“I can schedule you off on Tuesdays.” Hanji replied with a shrug of her own. I considered that, and it was strange to find that I didn't like it.

“I want to, though.” I said, so quietly I wasn't sure if she would hear me. My eyelids were beginning to droop. “M'sorry, Hanji.” I added.

“If you're apologizing for not taking your medication when you needed to, apology accepted,” she said, ruffling my hair slightly. She extracted herself from my grip, lying me down on the couch gently. “Let me get you a blanket.” she added, going to the linen closet. She pulled out an old, red flannel one that I had taken from Erwin's, both the nicest and warmest one I owned. It still smelled faintly of him when she draped it over me.

It was strange to realize that I was really, actually over him.

* * *

I spent Wednesday cleaning my kitchen. It was an involved process that usually took me at least half the day, but I also had to busy myself chopping and freezing vegetables. It turned out to be a therapeutic process, even if taking half an hour to dice one carrot was a little, well, ridiculous. By the time I had filled my freezer with the groceries Eren had bought, my fingers were cramped and my cutting board was every shade of the vegetable rainbow. I felt marginally better realizing that I wasn't going to be an asshole and waste his money.

The industrial cleaner I nicked from Room 23 burned my nostrils and eyes and throat as I scrubbed the sink, the stove, the inside of the refrigerator. When I started getting woozy, I opened the windows and walked out into the sun room, noticing that my neighbor was sitting on her patio reading. I wasn't sure if I should wave to her or pretend that she wasn't there, but she looked up before I made a decision. Our eyes met and she quickly looked down at her book, which told me all I needed to know. We would never speak.

I was completely fine with that, believe it or not.

I made quicker work of the counter tops, and the two dishes I needed to wash. The room still smelled strongly of deadly chemicals, but I still busied myself organizing my grains and pastas, re-labeling dates on the spices, and re-organizing them by shade. I had a certain fondness for the color of spices, lining up paprika, cayenne, curry, and turmeric. I looked at my handiwork, trying to figure out what I could paint using autumn colors. Nature was always a good bet, but I wasn't feeling especially nature-y and found trees irritating. They reminded me of watching Bob Ross when I stayed home from school.

With my kitchen cleaned and organized, I moved on to the living room, then the bathroom. By the time I hopped in the shower to wash the filth from myself, my throat burned, and my fingers were achier than ever. I stood with my face against the wall, hot water pouring down my back, remembering Eren's voice as it had filled my apartment.  _Black bird has died, red bird is on the rise_...

I wondered what it was supposed to mean; he had abandoned that song relatively quickly, though the piano for it was the best I had heard from him. I supposed it was like when I ditched paintings early, looking for appropriate inspiration before I ruined a canvas. I wondered if all musicians wrote music first, then lyrics, or if it was more common the other way around. I had next to zero knowledge about writing songs, but I tried to put together a melody in my head and found it woefully similar to something Eren had played.

I spent the rest of the day painting and drinking. I was less tense, but I still felt scattered. Hanji always rattled my nerves, that was just a part of life that I had learned to accept. I still felt anger towards Eren, though I knew it was undeserved. It was just so unfamiliar, the way I was starting to feel. I wanted to see him, I wanted to be near him. I hated it. I hated the idea that I was going to become entwined on someone else, perhaps want them in my life daily, maybe  _more_. I wasn't ready for it to proceed, but I had already proven myself to be poor at staying away from him.

Assumption was a big part of my internal struggle. I had no way of knowing whether or not Eren really gave a shit; he had sounded hopeful when he left my car, but he had also come to my apartment expecting sex and I had no way of knowing if he wanted anything more. It was just one layer of frustration in my head, and the longer I peeled them away, the more I found that I wasn't looking forward to the party I knew I was stuck going to. Fucking Hanji, fucking  _text messaging_.

I leaned away from my canvas. The smell of oil paint and solvent was a little nauseating after my cleaning spree, but the thick strokes of paint reflected the heaviness I felt as I painted. A bird lay to the side, a stark contrast of black against pale grass. A light dusting of snow covered its plumage. In the center of the canvas was the red bird, wings extended, taking flight against a gray winter sky. I didn't know if I had done Eren's vision justice, but I had every intention of hanging it on my wall if he didn't want it. It was comforting, somehow.

I lied around uselessly in bed until I had to go to class, which passed in a blur. I took a long shower when I got home, using my razor to carefully remove the sparse black hair from my legs. It felt weird and the smoothness was weird, but shit, how many times a year do you get to cross dress without people thinking you're all  _weird_?

Hanji showed up at 7:15, and I was impressed with how she had managed to make her costume — identical to mine to the last stitch, it seemed — look good. By comparison, I looked like a lifeless mannequin trying to pass itself off as human, but she squealed when she saw me and gave me a hug that I returned by patting her shoulder. When she stood back to admire her handiwork, she frowned.

“Levi, what are you wearing under that?” she asked, and I felt a faint heat in my cheeks. I was, of course, not wearing panties. I felt that was a little much, even for Halloween, but my boxers peeked out from underneath the ridiculous rainbow tutu and I can't say it lent much to the costume.

“Dignity?” I tried. Hanji snorted.

“You have a weird definition of dignity,” she commented. “And it's ruining my hard work. Did you try them on?”

“Do you not find it weird to go panty shopping for your male friends?” I countered, getting to my feet. I hadn't practiced in the shoeboots (Hanji called them “wedges”) as much as I had intended, but I could stay upright. Worst case scenario, I was going to be sitting. Especially if there was alcohol.

“Hey, I'm doing you a favor. Put them on, I'll wait!” she chirped. It was amazing how quickly she could get on my nerves.

“We're not leaving unless I wear them, are we?” I asked, and knew that I was trapped. I had no idea where we were going, as Eren hadn't bothered to text me since I'd poorly aimed my phone for my bed. I felt nervous realizing that. I would probably have to explain. He was probably a bit miffed.

I came out of the bathroom moments later, trying to adjust to the feeling of having my dick confined so tightly against my body. Hanji lifted the skirt, taking in a view of my ass that lasted far too long. “I can't believe I convinced you to wear these.”

“Har har,” I said in my most monotonous voice, picking up the canvas I had wrapped earlier in the morning. “Are you finished admiring my ass, or what?”

“Admiring!” Hanji giggled, dropping my skirt. She looked at the package in my hand, but didn't comment on it. I was grateful for that.

After a mostly silent ride, I found myself outside of the coffee shop. I looked at Hanji suspiciously, but she waved her hand. “Don't worry! I got permission to close it down. Doors are locked and everything.”

“You brought me to my place of work  _while I'm cross-dressing_?” I hissed. The car was parked, but I stayed in my seat, a sudden wave of anxiety rolling in like a sudden storm.

“God, Levi,” she sighed. “I have something else for you to wear if you're going to act all petulant.”

“Really?” I looked at her, a little surprised, and she gestured to the back seat. I didn't bother looking. “That was strangely considerate of you. Fine, fine.” I sighed, getting out of the car and following her to the side door. I could hear voices and music. My fingers were clenched tightly; I had no idea who I was going to come face to face with on the other side of the door.

I breathed a sigh of relief when I scanned the faces and came across several familiar ones. It looked like Eren's friends, as well as some people Hanji knew. I realized that there wasn't anyone there that knew just me, but that suited me fine. I had never been a social butterfly.

“Hanji!” a small woman (?) who was completely monochromatic bounced over to Hanji almost immediately. The costume was a little jarring, to say the least; she had painted her skin gray, her hair was white, and she wore a black dress that looked vaguely pin-up. Hanji was immediately pulled into conversation with her, both of them talking so energetically that I had a feeling it would be better to try to mingle with other people.

Petra waved at me from behind the counter, where she was making a cup of hot chocolate. “Drink?” she asked brightly. She looked me up and down, then gave a low whistle. “Nice costume.”

“Hanji made it,” I shrugged, trying to seem natural. “What are you, exactly?”

“Daenerys!” she responded. I gave her a blank look. “Game of Thrones?”

“Eh, never seen it.” I shrugged, joining her behind the counter to get a pot of coffee brewing. I didn't feel much like alcohol with my moods of late being what they were.

“Sasha came as a dragon, but I don't know where she got off to.” Petra leaned against the counter, adding a ridiculously large pile of whipped cream to the top of her hot chocolate.

“Dragons, I bet no one else had that idea.” I quipped. Petra rolled her eyes.

“Well, I am the mother of the dragons.” she said, as though I should have known that.

“Bet that was painful.” I said before I could help myself. Petra swatted at my arm, but gave me a bright smile regardless. I noticed her cheeks were pink, which was beginning to be a common occurrence as of late. I didn't have time to dwell on it; the side door opened and Eren came in with Armin and Mikasa, Jean and Marco not far behind them.

“Jaegerrrr!” I heard Reiner call from across the room, waving around one of his massive arms as though it would be hard to spot him in a sea of regular-sized people. I took my first good look at the room; there were stereotypical Halloween decorations, like cobwebs and fake gravestones. A long table was set up against the entrance, heavily laden with food and alcohol.

“Hanji set this up?” I asked Petra, only to turn and realize that she had wandered off to talk with Hanji and her mystery friend. Eren was approaching me already; he was dressed in what was clearly a costume as well, but I had no idea what he was supposed to be. If it weren't for the dog tag, hat, and weird knee sock combo I wouldn't have even known he was dressed up.

“Hey, can I have some of that coffee?” he asked me brightly, no greeting, no comment on my costume. I cocked my head to the side, exaggerating the offense I took.

“No coffee for people not in costume,” I answered; his eyes widened comically. “ _Shit_!” I burst out laughing, grabbing hold of the counter as my legs wobbled. “You really didn't know it was me! Cute, Jaeger, cute.”

“I am in costume,” Eren grumbled, looking away. The change in his demeanor was far too obvious; I was right, he was mad. “I'm Scout. Team Fortress 2.”

“Help yourself then, I'm not on the clock.” I said, gesturing in the general direction of the coffee mugs. Eren looked back at me, and it took me about five seconds to realize that he was angrier than I thought. Without a word, he turned and walked back over to Armin and Mikasa. I felt my insides clench momentarily, then slowly relax into nothing. I didn't move, frozen against the counter, when Hanji wandered over.

“Soooo, how'd it —” the stupid grin on her face disappeared when she looked at me. She glanced at Eren, then back at me, and frowned. “I'm sorry.”

“Take me home.” I replied. The party suddenly seemed like an incredibly stupid idea. I had never done well at parties, and with no fucking friends of my own, of course I had expected to hang around Eren or Hanji. It was a bitter slap in the face that I was already so put off by not being able to just be around Eren, the exact feeling I had never wanted in the first place. I was comfortable with him, and I enjoyed his company. It's a rare thing. “This isn't a take a pill and talk to me in an hour thing, I want to go home.” I said, my voice far too loud, but no one was paying attention.

“Alright, alright. Let me talk to Petra, go outside, I'll be right there,” I looked at her, trying to silently communicate, and she caught on quickly. She took hold of my arm, pulling me to the door and outside. “Just wait here. I'll just be a minute.”

The door closed behind her, and I was left to shiver in my silly little monster dress with my silly little monster hat. I took several deep breaths, wrapping my arms around myself to keep warm. A burst of warm air hit me as the door opened again, and I turned to grab onto Hanji. “About fucking time.” I snapped, but I wasn't holding onto Hanji's arm. Eren was looking down at me, his expression surly, but genuine concern in his eyes.

“Mind if I join you?” he asked quietly.

“Did she send you out here?” I asked, letting go of his arm and trying to move back. Eren grabbed hold of my shoulders to prevent me from crashing into the trash cans.

“Hanji? Nah. I kinda told her to fuck off, actually. She said I sound just like you.” he scratched the back of his neck, eyes never leaving my face. I stayed silent, knowing this would be a good time to apologize, but feeling too resentful to care.

“What do you want?” I asked. His expression darkened, and I fully expected him to turn and walk away.

“I dunno, I overheard some shit about you wanting to go home and not being able to fix it with a pill?”

“And?”

“And that's typically the kind of thing people would find  _concerning_?” Eren retorted, losing the calmness in his expression and glaring down at me. “Stop standing there acting all wronged when you've been a complete prick, I don't have patience for this shit right now.”

“Go inside, then,” I scoffed, looking away, the familiar beginnings of unease creeping down my spine. I shivered. “I didn't ask you to come out here.”

Eren was silent for a long moment. I continued looking away from him, my head filled with fluff, biting my tongue to stop myself from speaking. I was doing the same thing I had done to Hanji the night before, the thing where I let the louder, illogical voice in my head take control and fuck everything up. I wanted to blame Eren, but I knew it was my fault. I knew when I had found myself in bed with him, I was making the wrong decision. Not because I couldn't make things work, but because I was going about it in a way that I knew I couldn't handle. I had put myself in the situation with someone who genuinely didn't know any better, and he was calling me on my shit without a single hesitation.

“You're  _unbelievable_ ,” Eren cut across my thoughts. “You shove me out of your apartment with no explanation after you kiss me, you call me back over to spend the night with you less than a week later, and then you completely ignore me for three days? You flip your shit because I'm angry over it, and now you're just going to be a giant asshole about it all to my face?”

“Forget about it.” my voice was quiet, robotic. Eren scowled, a face that was far more ugly than I would have imagined he could make.

“Fine. I have no idea how you manage to function when you treat people this shittily, but hey, your friends are fucking saints.” he turned to go inside.

“Wait.” I said, quietly. Quietly enough that he could have ignored me if he wanted to, but he stopped with his fingers on the handle. He had hit a nerve, though he didn't realize it. “I didn't  _flip my shit_  because you're angry at me.”

“Alright,” Eren said sarcastically, dropping his hand. “Why, then?”

“Because...” I tried to keep talking, but my voice died somewhere in my throat. Eren was looking at me expectantly. I could tell him anything, just one shred of truth, and yet I wasn't even capable of that.

“Because?” Eren prompted me.

“Because I came here to see you.”

“To see me.” he repeated. It wasn't a question, more of a disbelieving statement.

“I like spending time with you,” I replied. Eren's eyes bored into mine, and it was everything I could do to hold his gaze. “And I don't know how to handle that.”

“Okay...” Eren looked as though he wasn't sure what to make of that information. God, he was so innocent. I wondered what it was like to never have struggled with your own mind. “I don't get it.”

“I don't like people,” I shrugged. He laughed, a real laugh, and I felt myself relax slightly. “If I don't like someone, I just don't bother with them.”

“Your method of liking people seems more misanthropic.”

“Ass.” I sighed, still feeling tightly wound, but not knowing how to express what I wanted to say.

“So are we talking drugs, or anti-depressants?” Eren asked when I didn’t continue. “It’s probably not really my business, but if we’re going to be friends…”

“I have a prescription for anxiety meds.” I rolled my eyes at him. I was on the verge of asking him if I seemed like the junkie type, but it was too close to home and I wasn't ready to address that. I didn't know at that point if I ever would be.

A breeze came through the parking lot, making me shiver. Eren moved to stand next to me, his body close, his arms around my shoulders.

“It this okay?” he asked me, quietly.

“I don't know,” I replied. I couldn't give him better than my honesty. “I don't know how to be normal about things. I can't give you answers. Maybe if you stick around, you'll understand, but there’s no crash course for dealing with this shit. I can’t wrap it up in a nice little box and make it make sense.”

“Have you considered therapy?” Eren asked, then laughed a little at the disdainful expression I was giving him.

“I'm not ready for that.”

“I can't make you any promises,” Eren was looking across the parking lot, his expression thoughtful. “I want to stick around, but this is all really…” he looked down, and I shook my head.

“That's fair,” I cut him off; I knew what he was getting at, but I also knew he wasn’t comfortable saying it. “But sometimes the best I'll be able to do is a text telling you I can't deal with your stupid face.”

“I'll take that as code for 'I really wish you were here but I'm having issues,' how's that?” he grinned at me, then averted his eyes. “Just talk to me, okay? Even if you had texted me to tell me to fuck off, that’s better than not knowing what your deal is.”

We fell silent. I didn’t know what to say to continue the conversation, and I didn’t really want to spend the entire night of a party standing outside in a dress, shivering, feeling awkward about my emotional problems. I had no gauge for how solved things were; I had told Eren so little. I hadn’t explained the sudden emptiness when I realized I was alone in the shop, the days I had spent laying on one surface or another just trying to block out my thoughts. He would see it, eventually, maybe soon. He would be confronted with what I couldn’t always control. I didn’t know how to feel about that.

Our proximity was beginning to make me feel uncomfortable, and Eren let me go without protest when I stepped away.

“So, you ready for a party?” I asked, trying to add a little bravado to my voice. It came out weird sounding, and Eren tossed his head back, laughing loudly. I smiled as the pink tinge in his cheeks, the hair that was peeking out from under his hat, and the way his eyes were still crinkled when he looked back down at me.

“I’m ready if you are.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Obviously, mental health is complicated and illness can manifest itself in a lot of ways. I don't want to categorize Levi as being OCD, or having an anxiety disorder or depression or what have you, it's a weird thing I have about diagnoses, I don't feel like they should be applied on a whim. I took bits of my own struggles, and the struggles of people close to me... hopefully it's tasteful. I don't feel like I've even really skimmed the surface, but Levi doesn't seem like the type to just unload and I tried to put that into the conversation.
> 
> I wasn't going to do the uh, full costume, but people seemed into that, so there you go.
> 
> Team BRA chapter and Eren POV up next, probably not in that order.


	9. I Thought You Might Be Mine

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dancing, drinks, discoveries, sleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have a few porny paragraphs in here, so yeah, fyi.
> 
> Not much else to say, except I have a tag for my Room 23 related doodles on my tumblr (ghosts-desu over there too). I'm going to work on monster-chan Levi and Hanji, so yeah.
> 
> Thanks Rapinii for being my beta-chan still and being awesome and making me feel good about my smut. Such a bro.

[Eren POV]

Room 23 was blissfully warm as I followed Levi in the door. He was wobbly on his feet, probably because of the heels he was trying to walk in. They made his legs look unnaturally long and caused his hips to swing oddly as he tried to compensate for the missteps he took. I wondered if he would be bothered knowing that I found his lack of poise to be endearing. He seemed bothered by everything else.

Levi was text-book polite with me for the first hour of the party. I noticed that he took shots between our different interactions, and the weird politeness became less weird and more genuine the more the alcohol began to affect him. I was sitting with Armin and Jean when he got up, announcing that he was going to bring me coffee. I hadn't asked since I'd come in the shop, and I had to hide my laughter to avoid Armin or Jean drawing any conclusions. Not that I wasn't out, but... Levi? I had no idea, and I wasn't about to do something stupid like to push him out of the closet. If the past few days were an indication, I'd never see him again.

Armin was fiddling with the chinstrap of his hat — he had done a collaboration with Mikasa, who had come as Princess Bubblegum. He made a pretty convincing Finn, even if Jake was only a stuffed backpack he'd ordered offline. Jean was wearing one of those ridiculous horse masks from Amazon, with glasses super glued to its eyes and a keffiyeh around its neck. The flannel, jeans, and Converse combo was less weird, but I didn't want to acknowledge that his costume was actually kind of funny. I'd called him horse face enough times for it to probably be a subtle “fuck you, man” in my direction.

It hadn't escaped me that Marco was dressed in equestrian attire. In the house we have a "don't ask questions" policy regarding their relationship. It's obvious that they had no idea what they were doing, so there was no need to complicate it further.

“Coffee.” Levi held out a large mug to me, looking down his arm at me with his usual severe expression. I took the cup from him with a nod.

“Thanks.” I smiled at him, and the severity of his expression seemed to lessen. I was aware Armin was looking between us suspiciously. I tried to look casual as I took a sip of my coffee, and was secretly glad when Hanji bounded over to grab Levi.

“Oi, woman, go away already.” Levi groaned. I noticed he had vacated his heels, and was actually a little impressed that he was able to stomach walking across the floor in his bare feet.

“Dance with me!” Hanji insisted, giving his arm another tug. Levi placed a hand on his hip, an action that I had begun to notice he used a lot. I wasn’t stupid enough to comment on it, but in a weird way it was pretty hot the way he would stick out his hip and pull that face, the one that threatened swift homicide.

“Yes, yes, this is my jam.” Levi snorted derisively, but followed Hanji to the small space where people I mostly didn’t know were dancing. Reiner was always the party type, so it wasn’t weird to see him dancing. I looked around for Connie, and quickly found him off to the side. It was weird to see him keeping to myself, until I noticed that he was leaning very close to one of the girls who worked in the shop.  If her face was any indication, he was doing a great job of keeping her entertained.

The rest of my friends were littered around the edges of the celebration; I wasn’t surprised to see Annie and Bertholdt quietly sipping their drinks, or Mikasa and Marco having a conversation in the furthest corner of the shop. We had always been party people, if the party only involved us. The fact that none of us had really mingled or cared to struck me as funny, and I laughed into my coffee as quietly as I could.

A sudden flash of colors brought my attention back to dance floor. I had been mostly ignoring the center of the room, in favor of observing other people. In a hundred years I could have never expected Levi to be the dancing type, but he was dancing with Reiner, who looked ecstatic to have someone willing to be his partner. His dancing had always been overly energetic and somewhat dangerous for those around him, so to see the two of them tightly coordinated and moving to the k-pop song that was playing was equal parts amazing and hilarious.

“Oh my god.” Jean snorted loudly, taking off his mask momentarily. I figured it was to get a better look at the duo. Armin was holding in silent giggles, the ears on his bunny hat flopping a bit as we watched Levi grind rather obscenely against Reiner, his feet locked to the ground and hips rolling seductively. There was a brief moment where I was sure I had caught a glimpse of pink satin under his skirt, and I had no idea what to do with that information. I chanced a glance over at Annie and Bertholdt; they both seemed entirely uninsterested in what Reiner was doing with other people, which didn't surprise me. They seemed to like letting him do his social thing; I admired the absolute trust between the three of them that no one would ever stray.

“So Jean, I was wondering,” I said as I looked away from the insincere mating dance. “Are you a gay horse, or something? Because you could have done without the mask.”

“Fuck off, Jaeger!” Jean snapped back irritably. Armin seemed like he was going to combust if he didn't get a free moment to let out his laughing fit. Jean glared at him.

“A very eloquent response.” I inclined my head subtly as I took another casual sip of coffee. The k-pop was fading. I could see Levi sauntering away from Reiner as the song ended, pink-cheeked and breathless.

“Do you have to be a dick all the time, Eren?” Jean retorted with an eye roll. He leaned back in his chair, folding his arms over his chest with a surly expression.

“I'm sorry, I'm sorry,” I replied, though I was mostly trying to watch Levi without _watching Levi_. “You make a very pretty horse. The prettiest horse.”

“Oh my god! Will you two shut up?” Armin laughed loudly, a lot more loudly than he would have done had he not been sipping on a mysterious green punch that tasted like caramel apples. It had no hints of alcohol but Armin's face was red as he absently stirred the contents of his drink with his complimentary cinnamon stick.

“You know me,” I shrugged before Jean had the chance to interject. Our frenemy status had mostly mellowed out since high school, but he had a talent for pissing me off that I was sure he spent hours in front a mirror perfecting. “Word vomit all day, every day.”

“Sounds about right.” Levi quipped as he came to stop in front of me. Without the heels he had been wearing, he seemed far too small to be possible. The opening notes of _Ho Hey_ were playing, and Levi held his hand out wordlessly to me. I considered brushing him off. I've never been a very good dancer, drunk or no, and I didn't much feel like giving Jean ammunition for shitty jokes. On the other hand, I had a feeling it would be a long time before I was invited again to hit the dance floor with someone so completely disinterested in all things trivial.

I responded by fitting my hand in Levi's, finding it to be unusually warm. Every time we had been in close quarters before, his fingers and toes had been almost icy.

“Having a good time?” I asked as I was half-pulled over to the area deemed a dance floor. Levi shot me a withering look over his shoulder. He usually had an expression akin to physical pain at the stupidity of what came out of people's mouths, so I took it in stride and chuckled as we began a vaguely sped up slow dance.

I was a little shocked to hear the lyrics come from Levi's mouth as we stepped to and fro, a little bouncy, nothing at all like the tightly controlled movements he'd used with Reiner. I caught Hanji gazing at us wistfully from the punch bowl and looked uncomfortably away, back at Levi. His flushed cheeks made his eyes look more blue than gray; instead of ominous, they were welcoming.

Concentrating as hard as I was at not stepping on his bare feet or tripping over my own, I was mostly oblivious about the closeness of our bodies until Levi pulled me closer. I didn't want to read too much into the song that he had chosen to dance with me to, but I kind of wanted to, even though I had no idea what was going on between the two of us. Levi was alternately hot and cold, to the point where I felt like I was experiencing mental whiplash.

I was the first to break eye contact; it was hard to maintain with someone with a piercing gaze like Levi's. The feeling of being laid bare in front of someone had never been so pronounced as it was with him. “Oi,” he said suddenly. I moved my eyes back to his face almost immediately, partially because it was polite, and partially because Jean was looking at me with an expression like Christmas had come early. “What are you looking at? Look at me.”

“I'll take it into consideration.” I replied with much more confidence than I was currently feeling. The corners of his mouth tilted up at my response.

“You're such a brat.” he dropped his hand from my waist when the song ended. I was disappointed at the loss of contact, but he pulled me along by the hand to the food table. “Fucking starving.” he added as he began to nearly place food on his plate. I noticed he avoided anything with meat and made a mental note not to bring around bacon if I ever shopped for him again.

Unlike the time I had been in his apartment, I was confident in my decision not to point out how carefully Levi had arranged his plate. It was almost as if the food was paint and the plate were the canvas. None of the different dishes were touching, and organized by color.

We took seats by the window after I had tossed food onto my own plate without looking, observing more than talking as we ate. I couldn't tell if Levi was as interested in my habits as I was his; his eyes remained mostly on the other guests in the shop, but he met my gaze a few times as I watched him eat. Even though the arrangement was strictly finger food, he ate with a knife and fork, not moving on from one dish until he had completely finished the one he was on.

I'll readily admit to the fact that I know nothing about OCD, but the way Levi ate and the way he cleaned his apartment had led me to wonder if he might have a mild form of it. The idea of going into a relationship with someone who clearly had unresolved baggage was a little scary. I've never been anything but stubborn, and I had no way of knowing how I would actually react when I got that text that basically said 'I have no interest in you what-so-ever today.'

I had been considering whether or not if was fair to really try pursuing anything at all with him knowing that there was every possibility that I would check out if it became too much. I had dealth with depression in Mikasa after her parents died; no matter how much I loved her, there came a point when it was tiring just to see her. It became even more pronounced after mom died, but it gave me a humble perspective on what it was like to truly find getting out of bed to be the day's greatest success.

“Something on your mind?” Levi brought me out of my musings. I paused, my fork hovering in the air as I considered him. Now wasn't the time to bring up my doubts, but pushing them down to idle in the back of my mind wasn't the best idea either. I still chose the latter of the two.

“Who convinced you to come dressed like that?” I asked in reply. Levi's expression changed so minutely that it would be hard to catch if I hadn't been paying attention. He didn't seem to buy that I was thinking about his costume, but he let it slide.

“My she-demon twin.” Levi replied, gesturing the general direction of Hanji. Taking in the fact that yes, their costumes were identical, I probably should have seen that answer coming.

“What are you wearing under it?”

 _God dammit_. I audibly sighed at my words, a classic Jaeger case of speaking without putting an ounce of thought behind the words.

I didn't expect Levi to get up, or what he said next. “Come find out.” He then took off in the direction of the break room in the back of the shop. I looked down at my half-eaten food, then back to Levi. There was that whiplash again.

“Shit.” I muttered under my breath as I followed him. I couldn't help feeling a little giddy when I caught up to him, glancing down at his swinging hips. I wondered briefly if he weren't putting on a bit for me, but I quickly banished that thought. He didn't really seem like the type.

“Employees only!” Levi suddenly barked, making me jump. I opened my mouth to apologize, but quickly realized that Levi was glaring at Jean and Marco, who were tangled up together on the table. They both looked a little embarrassed, but I think the alcohol had wiped their minds of the fact that up until this point, they had been trying to keep their relationship inconspicuous.

Levi didn't pause to see whether or not they left. I found myself in a small, messy office, watching him pull off the wig and rainbow skirt thing. The dress he wore under the skirt barely skimmed the tops of his thighs, and I was now definitely sure that he was wearing something distinctly pink and lacy underneath it all. “Like what you see?” he teased softly, slowly pulling up the hem until I could see his cock pressed against tight satin.

“Ha.” I laughed, forcing myself to look away from the display and meet his eyes. “Do you _normally_ wear women's underwear, or...?”

“First time.” Levi shrugged. He dropped down to his knees, the dress falling back down to cover him, and went straight for the button on my jeans. I sputtered as he pulled down the zipper, having not actually expected taking a peek at panties to turn into anything sexual, at least not while we were in what looked like a manager's office. Very naive of me, I know.

I realized I was already partially hard, without any idea as to why until I caught sight of Levi's ass perfectly framed with satin, tiny pink bows in a line straight down the back.

Oh. _Oh_.

“W-wait,” I said, grabbing his hands. Levi looked up at me without saying anything. “Are you sure about this?”

It was quiet as Levi seemed to go through an internal struggle. His eyes darkened perceptibly, and he simply nodded. I swallowed nervously, not sure whether I should press the matter or not, but Levi's mouth was on me and all thought was gone.

“ _Fuck_.” I hissed as Levi took the head of my cock into his mouth. He didn't start out with teasing licks or his hand, just went straight for it, and I had to grab onto the desk behind me to stay upright. He made an amused noise in his throat that I could feel, gazing at me from half-lidded eyes partially hidden by his disheveled hair.

I took in a ragged breath as Levi worked his tongue down the shaft. I was trying to focus on the sensation and definitely not the fact that Jean and Marco were possibly in the next room fucking on a table, or the loud music I could hear through the wall. It was surreal to watch Levi's head bob back and forth, his eyes closed and brows knitted in concentration as he worked to take my entire length into his mouth.

Levi stalled in his movement, reaching up to grip my hips and pull them forward. I felt utterly lost and whined a little at the loss of friction, until he repeated the motion a few times and it clicked in my head. “You're filthy,” I murmured approvingly, pushing black fringe out of his face to properly look at him. His cheeks colored faintly. “You look pretty with my dick in your mouth.” I added in a low purr, only to be rewarded with a long lick along the underside of my cock.

I bit back my moan as I threaded my fingers through Levi's hair, holding his head still and giving a shallow, experimental thrust. Levi's eyes were back on my face, watching me intently. I couldn't look away as he pushed his head down to meet my movement, tiny mouth opening wider to accomodate my entire length.

I moaned as I pulled away, only to push my cock back into his mouth. We quickly found a comfortable rhythm, Levi's lips moving further and further down until I felt the head press the back of his throat. I was vaguely aware that I was panting, my fingers so tight on his hair that it must have been uncomfortable, but he only grunted and forced his mouth down until I felt his throat give. “Shit, _shit_.” my voice was a broken shudder. I could feel the slow build in my stomach that told me orgasm was coming. “Fucking christ, that's good.” I gasped, my voice low and raspy and foreign to my own ears. Levi flicked his tongue out, briefly pressing the wet tip against my balls, grunting again as my hips jerked.

I came with a strangled yelp before I had time to register what was happening, my muscles going rigid. Levi swirled his tongue over the head of my cock like he was determined not to miss a drop, before leaning back, a string of spit falling down his chin. I took several deep, shaky breaths, a shudder running through my body as I sank on top of the desk.

Levi, on the other hand, looked strangley invigorated by the situation. He was sitting back on his knees and looking up at me with this weird, contented expression that I didn't quite get. There was a bead of cum at the corner of his mouth, his cheeks were red, his eyes heavy-lidded... I had the maddening urge to drop to the floor and take him right there.

“What just happened?” I laughed shakily, re-buttoning my pants and hoping my dick would be kind enough to stop creating a tent in my pants before Levi decided it was time to leave the office.

“Don't flatter me too much, Jaeger,” Levi replied calmly. His voice had just the slightest touch of hoarseness to it. “It'll go to my head.”

“Yeah, I... shit. I'm not clever post-orgasm.” I laughed again, and Levi's eyes crinkled in amusement.

“I'll let that one pass, even though it was a perfect set-up.”

Levi got to his feet, fixing his skirt back onto his hips and picking up his wig. After a brief examination of it, he jammed it a little sloppily onto his head. The pre-blowjob thoughts that had been trickling into my head came back full force, but I was able to plaster a smile on my face as Levi trotted out of the room, like he didn't care if I followed him or not. I followed after him, relieved that neither Jean nor Marco were around, therefore lessening the chances that I'd been overheard moaning.

The party was a little more subdued when we exited the break room, and I suspected it had a lot to do with the fact that Reiner was no longer anywhere to be seen. His energy tended to be infectious, Bertl and Annie being the only usual exceptions. “Wanna get out of here?” I asked, hovering back. Levi turned to look at me.

“Best idea you've had all night.” he said, his expression unchanging. I wasn't sure if he was being sarcastic or serious, which seemed to be a common problem with him.

“I do what I can.”

We said our goodbyes, Hanji's including a cheerful “you're fired!” to Levi that made him look alarmingly murderous. She winked at me, though, and I felt my face go hot.

The walk to Levi's apartment was short, and mostly silent. Levi was draped in the coat I had brought, which was almost as long as his skirt. I had a hard time not pointing this out to him, because that, couple with the heels and the drunken waver he had acquired at the party, frankly made him look adorable. I had a feeling that was not the adjective that Levi wanted applied.

“Smells like cleaning products.” I wrinkled my nose as soon as I entered his apartment. It was somehow even more clean than the last time I had been permitted entry. Levi grumbled as he struggled to untie his shoes, finally kicking them off and leaving them by the mat at his door.

“Open a window.” Levi answered, a little surprisingly. I had expected to get sarcasm in return, but he seemed very focused on getting out of his costume. I wandered into the kitchen to open the window, cold air immediately making me shiver. Figuring a glass of water would be a good idea for the morning, I made two glasses and re-entered the living room.

Levi was sitting on the couch, wearing a t-shirt and looking exceptionally normal. He gave me an appreciative look as I sat down next to him and handed him a glass of water, but didn't say anything. I had no idea what I was supposed to be doing at that moment, or if he even really wanted me to stay, and he didn't seem concerned with letting me know. I relaxed back into the couch while he flipped through channels, laughing quietly as he turned off the TV in exasperation.

“If Hanji were here I'd be stuck watching Star Trek.” he commented as he got up and turned on his laptop.

“Didn't see her being a Star Trek fan.” I commented, trying to keep my face serious as Levi turned to give me a disbelieving look.

“Sometimes I think it's more that she's a fan of tormenting me than anything else,” he turned on some music and came back to the couch, flopping down heavily and leaning back. “Uggghhh.” he added, eyes closing.

“Water,” I reminded him. The music he had put on was a little unusual to me, reminding me a little of 80s music, with a good, dance-y beat.

Levi took his glass and drained it of water, then looked at me expectantly. “Have mine. I don't get hangovers.”

“Then you party too much.” Levi grumbled. He pulled a flannel blanket off the back of the couch and put it over both of us, leaning close and resting his head on my shoulder.

“Is there any evidence to support that fact?” I rolled my eyes, though he had known me for... what, two weeks? Three? I couldn't really keep track, mostly due to the fact that we didn't really keep up regular conversation. Regardless, he had been to two parties with me in that time, even though one of them was hardly able to qualify.

We both fell silent, comfortably so, as Levi's head drooped on my shoulder. His breathing quickly deepened, and I found myself unsure of whether I should move and let him take the couch, or stay put and avoid waking him up.

I placed my glass of water on the table next to the couch carefully. Levi made a quiet noise. “That side reclines.” he murmured, sitting up momentarily so that I could recline. He lied down with his head on my thigh, muttering indistinctly as he fell back asleep. My mind was buzzing as I closed my own eyes, trying to fall asleep as well, but not being drunk enough to immediately drift off.

Confusion. That was the main feeling I had. Though we had started our night with an argument, if you can really call me confronting him about the fact that he was an asshole an argument, the rest of it seemed entirely normal. I found myself running my fingers through Levi's hair as I pondered him, pondered what was going on behind those bored gray eyes.

It was only as I fell asleep that I realized I have no fucking clue what I was getting myself into.


	10. Home is Whenever I'm With You

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Team BRA back story.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This one took a little extra time... I'm not as familiar with Reiner and Bertl.
> 
> This is the last bit from the Halloween party. Since it's not explicitly stated, Annie went as a flapper and Reiner and Bertl were gangsters. the 1920s kind.
> 
> Next chapter is back to Ereri.

[Annie POV]

I felt relief as we left the coffee shop party. I had never been one for social gatherings, but it was worse for Bertl. I tried my best to soothe him as we sat quietly at the edge of the party, watching Reiner dance his ridiculous dance with the dude I'm fairly sure Eren was fucking or interested in fucking. Eren had never been very discreet, no matter how much he tried to keep his intentions secret.

“Are you sleeping, Annie?” I looked away from the car window, meeting Bertl's eyes in the rear view mirror. Reiner was conked out in the front seat, snoring quietly.

“Nope,” I answered. We were pulling into the long driveway along the side of the house. It was weird to come home to a completely empty house, but not unwelcome. We had both always been of few words, well, me more than Bertl sometimes. “You can wake up the fatty.” I added, getting out of the car as soon as it came to a halt.

I was already inside, hanging up my heavily beaded dress in our crammed closet when my boys joined me. Reiner's pinstripe suit was heavily rumpled; he looked sloppy next to Bertl, who had a thing for keeping his appearance neat. “Heyyy,” Reiner slurred as I stared putting on my pajamas. I merely looked at him. “No no, stay comfortable.” he waved a large hand, shrugging his button-down right onto the floor.

“You're far too drunk for that.” I teased, but I tossed my t-shirt aside and crawled into the middle of the bed we shared. Bertl joined me moments later, both of us watching as Reiner struggled and finally succeeded in removing his belt and pants.

“Never too drunk.” Reiner grunted. I shivered a little at the feeling of Bertl's fingers down my back, leaning against his side as Reiner half flopped, half crawled in between us. He was asleep by the time his head hit the pillow.

“Classic Reiner.” I smiled affectionately at Bertl, who laughed quietly. He edged carefully to the wall; there was a long-standing agreement that he would always be separated from me by Reiner, who could take his restless sleeping easier than I could. Then again, Reiner had never woken up with a bloody nose and Bertl's elbow on his face.

“Annie,” Bertl started. I paused half-way to lying down, resting on my elbows instead and looking over at him. Unlike when we were in public, he didn't look nervous to be addressing me, just concerned. “What's been on your mind lately?”

I wasn't surprised that Bertl had noticed that I'd been _off_. I had been sulking for days, and though Reiner had tried his hardest to get me to lighten up, I still felt withdrawn. I realized he looked a touch more worried than I had originally noticed, and I frowned. “Nothing major. I've just … I've been thinking about Juilliard.”

“Oh.” was all Bertl said in reply, and he looked away from me. I felt a lurch in my stomach looking at him, not understanding why he looked so damn _dejected_. What did my feelings on what had happened in New York mean to him, exactly? It wasn't like he was stuck replaying the memories in his head.

I had been stupid, growing up and only listening to my father and his wishes for my future. I showed up at Eren's one morning, bruises on my face hidden by makeup, but Reiner and Bertl... they could somehow see that the cold face I showed the world was a lie. Jean and Eren were so involved in their argument that the sound of heavy silence didn't immediately reach them. Bertl's hands were gentle on my shoulders, Reiner's thumb swiping through the makeup, through my tears, rage etched so visibly in his face that I was momentarily terrified. Not _of him_ , but of what he could do if he unleashed his rage on my father.

“I didn't want to miss practice.” I whispered. I didn't know why I was trying to explain myself. What I was trying to explain. Eren and Jean had both stopped bickering, looking at me, and I wasn't sure if it was Jean moving toward the door first or Eren, but Reiner was lowering his hand to join them and I felt panic rising. “No!” I shouted, my voice was desperate and pathetic sounding to my ears. Bertl's hands on my shoulders were all that kept me from running after them and trying to pull them back.

Reiner froze at my voice. The struggle to keep his calm was overwhelmingly plain in his face. “Guys, don't.” he said finally. Eren looked between me and the door. He still had anger problems, then; his fists were clenched, his arms shaking from rage.

“It will only make things worse.” Bertl said, quietly.

We were only seventeen, but they crowded around me while I bawled into Reiner's chest. We had just been a band what seemed like only months ago, but there was something more now, years later. I had never intended to get attached to Jean or Eren, and to some degree I was trying to detach from Reiner and Bertl. I was leaving after our next show, to New York City of all places. Close, but so far.

“We all knew,” Jean said as I packed up my guitar. Our practice session had gone on far into the night; I had no hope of sneaking in unnoticed, but Bertl had offered to take my guitar to his place. It would mean I didn't have to explain that I'd been off with my _shitty_ band, my _childish_ friends, _wasting my classical experience_. “We just didn't know what to say. Fuck that, though. You can stay with me, my parents won't care, I'm sure if we just explain it to them —”

“No,” I shook my head, but I gave Jean the best smile I could under the circumstances. “It's only two weeks, and then I'm free. I don't want to jeopardize that.”

I walked home with Reiner and Bertl; I was in between them, holding their hands. It was the most comforted I had felt in a long time, feeling their warmth, feeling their care. I knew that I didn't want to leave them behind, but what choice did I have? The band would never go anywhere. It was fun, but my father was right. It was a waste of my talent, and at risk of sounding egotistical, I have a great deal of musical talent. How could I not, with the life my parents had forced on me? Piano at 5, violin at 8, and never-ending practice on both until we added vocal training into the mix.

“Where have you been?” my father asked as soon as I entered the house. I winced.

“I was with my friends,” I tried, cautiously. The lack of a guitar in my hand seemed to have prevented him from going into an immediate rage, but I had no idea what would set him off. “Saying goodbye. I need to prepare to take school seriously, right? So I said goodbye.” I added, hoping the desperation that was so obvious to me was lost on him. Hoping my lie was masked well enough with just the hint of truth.

I was allowed to go to bed with an insincere apology from my father. I had no idea that what I had said was the unintentional truth. I had no idea that the next morning my parents were going to take me from the only people who had ever cared for me, truly cared for me, with no warning.

We left for New York the next morning. I had only listened half-heartedly when my parents talked me through orientation and moving in. I had known this was coming, and yet I had pushed it firmly from my mind. There wasn't going to be a last show, I wasn't going to get a chance to tell the band goodbye. I considered running before I got in the car, but spending four hours in a car with furious parents seemed counterproductive to escaping quietly and unharmed.

“Reiner.” I whispered the name into my phone in a truck stop bathroom, my limbs shaking, my shoulders shaking.

“Annie? What... what time is it?” Reiner grumbled, and I could see him laying face down on his bed as I had many times before when I had gone to wake him up.

“Is Bertholdt with you?” I asked. “I don't have much time.” I added, a plea.

“Yeah... Bertl, wake up. Bertl!” Reiner's voice was suddenly devoid of any traces that he had been asleep, tinged with a hint of worry. I heard a grunt on the other end of the line, and then I was on speakerphone.

“Guys...” I was still whispering. I was too afraid to speak any louder.

“Are you alright? Do I need to come get you?” Reiner asked immediately. I said nothing, only sniffled. There was silence on the line, before Reiner gently prodded me. “C'mon, girl. We can't help if we don't know what's going on.”

“I'm in … I'm in Connecticut.” I answered. I held back the sob that wanted to leave, but tears spilled from my eyes uncontrollably, dripping from my chin onto my sweatshirt.

“...Connecticut?” Bertl asked. His voice was sharp, unusually so. I knew he wanted me to contradict what I said, but I couldn't.

“I didn't have a choice, I have to go to orientation. I just wanted to say goodbye. I'm sorry.”

“Wait a minute, Annie,” Reiner sounded a touch panicked now. “Goodbye? We'll see you again soon, for Thanksgiving, right?”

“I don't know. _I don't know_ ,” I replied, shaking my head even though neither of them could see me. “But I have to go. I just wanted to tell you...”

“Annie,” they spoke at the same time, then it was just Reiner. “We'll see you again soon. I promise.”

“Okay,” I choked the word out, then jumped as someone pounded on the bathroom door. I had no illusions about who it was. “I'm sorry. I love you both, and I'm sorry for telling you when it's too late.”

I hated myself at those words, and hung up the phone before either of them could answer. When I opened the door, I was greeted with a slap in the face and my phone being wrestled from my hand. My father stalked away angrily, breaking it in half and throwing it in the trash. The screen had been lit up, and I knew Reiner had been calling me back. I wanted to scream, to throw punches at my father until he knew what it was like to be trapped in a corner. Afraid. Alone.

The fight left me as I realized that he had single-handedly rendered me completely _alone_.

“Let's fix your makeup.” my mom, who was somehow colder than me, walked into the bathroom with her purse. I had never had a mother, not really. She was withdrawn and emotionless, absorbed in the faux socialite lifestyle that she was able to live. I don't know if my father had ever loved her, or vice versa. They went so far as to even have separate bedrooms, though they had perfected the loving husband and wife act around anyone who looked in from the outside. It was sickening.

It wasn't until later that I realized my mother was as trapped as I had been. I knew her story well enough, even if I had ignored it; she had been my age when she met my father, and so taken that she rushed into marriage. Her parents had been poor, worked themselves to the bone before I was 10. My father had no care for them, little care for my mother's well being. He would never help anyone that couldn't help him.

In the end, my mother was too used to the money that my father had, incapable of giving up her cushy life, but hating every minute of it. I had never pitied her until that day in the truck stop, when I realized she had makeup caked over her own bruises. Even still, the pity didn't last long; it was hard to pity someone who was too weak to save herself, or her daughter, from such a life. The so called instinct that women had towards motherhood was never present in her. I still have trouble believing in such a thing.

I don't remember much about school. It took maybe six weeks before I stopped leaving my dorm; the prestige associated with the school I had been accepted to meant nothing to me. Having to appease anyone with how I chose to express myself meant nothing to me. What was I supposed to do with a degree in music and no drive to do anything with it? How could I come back from Juilliard and settle for teaching children how to play piano skills? I wasn't Eren, I had no talent for setting up gigs. I wasn't like Reiner or Jean, both personable people who could sell themselves to anyone they spoke with. I was quiet, I had chronic bitch face, and I didn't give a damn if anyone liked what I played.

I realized I had given up one cage for another, and I was almost willing to endure whatever would happen when I went home just to have a semblance of a life that I had chosen for myself.

Waking up at half past two and finding the dorm to be empty and dark every day almost made me feel ashamed of what my life had become. I had become fixated on the idea of going home, unable to function except to browse the internet and look like I was doing something important when my roommate, Mina, trudged in at 9 PM every night. She was a drama student, and she seemed completely dedicated to what she did.

Mina was a kind girl. She could be over-eager in her attempts to befriend me, but it was comforting to have someone looking out for me. I don't think she ever realized that I had stopped going to class; she asked me questions routinely, but didn't seem put off when I gave her half answers or dodged her entirely. She didn't ask questions when I would give her money and ask her to bring me back food, or why I seemed to never practice.

Nah, in retrospect, it was probably pretty obvious that I wasn't doing my course work. I think she was just too nice to bring it up.

Time until Thanksgiving was winding down, and I had never looked so forward to going back to my parent's house than I did while I was living in New York. I had no expectation for what would happen once I got there, but I figured sneaking out of the house to see the band was in order. I hadn't heard from Reiner or Bertl since I had called them from the bathroom in Connecticut; were they angry? Had they picked up on what I had even meant? Reiner didn't usually pick up on things that were overly subtle, but I knew there was a good chance Bertl had noticed something.

The only question was whether he would tell Reiner.

I would have seen it coming if I weren't so wrapped up in my own depression. I was failing all of my courses, it was too late to withdraw, too late to pretend things were fine and I wasn't completely wasting the massive amount of money that my parents had cosigned on me borrowing. I had two options at that point: get it over with and hope to cushion the fall, or wait until I was put on probation and lost my financial aid to confess. Either way I would have to drag my sorry ass back home, a failure. I was only seventeen; what else could I do?

“Do you think your parents would try to stop you from leaving?” Mina asked me. I didn't have anyone else to talk to, and she was so... _open_ about it. She didn't judge me. She understood.

“I don't know.” I answered her honestly. She seemed as thrown by that as I was, and then she asked me the question that would be the catalyst for the rest of my life.

“Isn't there someone who can help you?”

Of course there was. At least, I hoped there was. I couldn't let go of the hope, though, that I could run back to Reiner and Bertl, or to Jean, or even Eren. Hadn't they all offered to help me? Hadn't I found companionship in all of them?

I left Penn Station with a cheap flip phone and about half the clothes I had taken to Juilliard. I could remember Reiner's number off the top of my head, but the phone rang until I got voice mail. “Reiner, it's me. Annie. Call me, please.” I said, then hung up. I tried Bertl's phone just to be on the safe side, but he didn't answer, either. It was a little nerve wracking, but I tried to put it from my mind.

That is, until I was standing at the Amtrak train station in Back Bay with no missed calls. I sat next to my bag, curled up on a bench as people bustled around me. I hadn't called my father, and now I was too chicken shit to call Reiner or Bertl back. I squeezed my phone tightly, tears threatening to fall. Why hadn't I gotten in touch with Jean or Eren when I had been near a computer? How was I going to track them down at half past midnight, with an almost dead phone?

I was almost positive the sobs were going to start rolling out when my phone vibrated. I looked at the screen; seeing Bertl's name calmed me in a way that I never imaged it could.

“Bertholdt!” I didn't bother with hellos, or explaining myself. “Where are you guys!?”

“Reiner's phone is dead,” Bertl replied. “Is everything alright?”

“I'm at the Back Bay station,” I said in a rush. “Come pick me up?” I added, not sure if that was something that they were still willing to do.

“We'll be there in twenty,” Reiner's voice came, a little softer than Bertl's, and I realized that I was on speaker phone. I drew in a shaky breath, smiling despite the situation; hearing both their voices again was enough to make everything okay. “Wait outside the main entrance.”

“Should we stay on the phone?” Bertl asked, quietly.

“No, no. I'm okay.” I assured them, and I was. I didn't realize it right away, but I really was.

We hung up and I breathed a sigh of relief. Had I really expected that they would abandon me after two months? The slight feeling of shame was completely overshadowed by the fact that they would be there soon, and I got to my feet shakily. My bag felt immensely heavy as I hauled it outside, the cold Boston air even worse than I remembered.

The time between the phone call and their arrival seemed to stretch on for hours. I caught sight of Bertl first, then Reiner; they were both scanning the crowd for me. They had matching expressions of excited anxiousness, and I couldn't stop myself from calling out their names. My stomach lurched as their eyes found me, and I was running as fast as I could down the sidewalk, my bag forgotten at the door.

Reiner caught me in a hug that lifted me from my feet, Bertl not far behind. I reached out an arm and pulled him into the hug, not caring that tears were cascading down my face, or that people were staring at us. “Take me home,” I said between sobs, looking desperately between them. “With you, I want to be with you.”

“You can stay with us as long as you need to.” Reiner assured me, wiping my tears away gently. I nodded, but I wasn't ready to let go of them. I had to get everything out in the open, but I didn't know where to start.

“I dropped out,” I started recklessly, looking over Reiner's shoulder at nothing. I felt my cheeks burn and a fresh wave of tears. I was a failure, crawling back to my only two friends. How would I support myself? Did they even want me to stay with them? They were here, reassuring me, but I still felt a twinge of uncertainty.

“We'll talk about it when we get home, okay?” Reiner looked at me squarely in the eyes, and I nodded. Home. I was going _home_.

\----

“Do you regret it?”

I turned my head to the side, to where Bertl was still leaning against the headboard. He wore a strange expression, like trepidation, like he didn't want to hear what I was about to say.

“Regret what?” I replied. I wasn't sure how long I had zoned out for. Reiner was still asleep between us, face down, one hand across Bertl's lap and the other across my stomach.

“Leaving Juilliard.” was Bertl's simple reply, and my earlier confusion clicked in my head.

“The only thing I regret about Juilliard is that I ever went.” I replied evenly. Bertl's expression relaxed slightly.

I climbed over Reiner, who grunted, to settle myself into the small pocket of space between my boys. Bertl's arms were around me immediately; I cuddled into his side, resting my head on his chest. “I love you.” I whispered, still self-conscious after three or so years, but unable to hide my smile.

Bertl was quiet, still processing what I had said. He wasn't one to toss around I love yous, so it didn't bother me that he didn't respond. Reiner was rolling towards us, and I was amused that even in sleep he could noticed when there was a lack of warmth at one side. “I'll do the dishes innaminit.” he grumbled, throwing his arm over both of us. I reveled in being between them, held by their strong arms. I was home.

Bertl's eventual response was so quiet that I almost didn't hear it, but I felt butterflies in my stomach as though it was the first time I had laid in bed with the two of them. “Love you, too.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thx Rapinii for beta-chan and Bertl expertise. Lov. <3


	11. The World at Large

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Awkward flirting, memories of the past, the unexpected and unwanted.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TRIGGER WARNING: Drugs.
> 
> I've been sitting on this one for a few days, looking for the right song. It seems like a small detail but the one I had just wasn't right.
> 
> http://youtu.be/FmEXJmxuzk4 | Modest Mouse - The World at Large
> 
> ...This story is probably going to be longer than I thought. It's not turning out at all like I imagined when I started writing it, but I think the introspection and inner voice is fun.
> 
> THX RAPINII EPIC BETA-CHAN

When I came back from my morning run, Eren had already taken off. There was a note on the table in messy scrawl I could barely read, rambling about classes, work, and french toast in the microwave. I frowned at it, disappointed to have missed him in such a small window of time. I wondered if he hadn't waited around until I had left before getting up; true to my inability to sleep, even drunk, I had been studying since who even knows when. I was hungry and looking forward to french toast, but I was still a little surprised when I went in the kitchen. There was a note on the sink that said “cook doesn't do dishes,” which was so _Eren_ that I would have laughed if not for the pile of mess in my sink.

If he had been anyone else...

It was another day of class and school work. I flirted with the idea of texting Eren, but with as much as I had accomplished in my three day fit, I was still behind. At least, I still felt that way. Writing papers only got me so far in understanding what I was supposed to take away from each course, and I was dangerously close to slipping into a comfort zone that ensured a poor finish to my outstanding academic career. It was already 4:30 when I decided that spending the day in the library seemed like a good resistance to that comfort zone.

I still caved ridiculously fast, sending a generic text in an attempt to feel out where exactly we stood… if we stood anywhere at all. Hadn’t I kind of thrown a wrench into that? Or had I fixed it? I had no idea, but Eren had been on my mind ever since I had come back to my apartment and found him gone. It was irritating, French toast and note doing little to calm my nerves.

I hadn’t thought much about the previous night, but now that I was alone with my thoughts I felt unsettled. Not like I had earlier in the week; overall, I was fine. It occurred to me that blowing someone off and then blowing them was probably a little strange, especially when I had done my best to excuse myself from the situation. It wasn’t really fair, the way that I would contradict myself constantly, and I had a feeling that Eren probably agreed with that personal assessment.

_Busy tonight, sorry_

I looked at the text. Well, it didn’t tell me much of anything, except that maybe now was a good time to keep my distance. Before I finished forming that thought in my head, my phone vibrated several more times.

_I’m playing a show lol sorry, I'm at work_

_It’s at The Paradise_

_you should come check us out, I’ll get you in backstage and everything ;D_

I exhaled a breath that I wasn’t aware I was holding. What was wrong with me? I frowned at the uncertainty that waited, buried deep in the recesses of my mind. It came creeping out of the corners often, and I had let it convince me of my worthlessness far too many times. The idea of putting up a fight with my own mind was one I hadn't entertained for possibly a decade, and my hands seemed a little clammy just at the thought of resisting what I had long ago allowed to bend me fully to its will.

I typed out my response — “What time?” — and hit enter before putting my phone down next to my open book. It was just after six, but it was also Friday and I felt especially tired. I had jumped a few mental hurdles in the past week, and I really wanted to sleep more than anything else.

“Levi?” Eren's voice — _Eren's voice_? — brought me out of my internal grumbling. I looked up from my text book; Eren was standing in front of me with cart loaded with books, wearing a BU hoodie and those fucking ridiculous hipster glasses. They made him look adorable, and I hated them even more for that.

“You work here, I take it.” I stated, remembering that someone eerily similar had waved me goodnight the last time I had visited the library.

“Nah, I just like pushing book carts around. Gotta get a workout somehow,” Eren shrugged, trying to look casual as he leaned against said cart. I merely looked at him until he cracked a grin. “Coming to the show?”

“I don't know...” I trailed off, trying to sift through excuses that were worthwhile.

“Hanji's coming.” Eren added hopefully. My excuse rolodex screeched to a halt in my head. I was trapped before I'd even had the chance to give myself a proper defense, and I felt shitty for feeling that way. Eren wasn't something I needed to _escape_.

“What time?” I asked. I stood to begin packing my things, shoving it all rather haphazardly in my bag.

“Show starts at nine, but we won't be on 'til I dunno, 45 minutes later? Give or take.”

I looked up at Eren, struck again by just how much taller than me he was. He had a broad set of shoulders, nothing like Erwin, but he could still envelope me with his arms. I realized that Eren was giving me a questioning look, and I cleared my throat. “If Hanji is going to be there, I'll be there.”

“Don't come if you're not interested.” Eren shrugged, his voice casual. I wasn't sure if he had intended the obvious double entendre, but his expression was cool and his gaze unwavering.

“Cute, Jaeger,” I smirked a little, or at least I tried to, as I slung my bag over my shoulder. It was always a little difficult regaining my balance after bad periods of anxiety, but finding my footing around Eren Jaeger seemed even more difficult. He didn't rise to my sarcasm, or seem concerned with my crude personality. “But I don't recall saying I wasn't interested.”

“Don't be so serious,” Eren rolled his eyes, reaching out and grabbing ahold of my cheeks. I had about .5 seconds to give him an incredulous look, before my face was contorted by his hands pushing together. “You look like a grumpy old man.”

“J'te jure que si t'étais n'importe qui d'autre...” I grumbled as Eren let go of my face.

“Eeeh?” he asked, tilting his head to one side. “I don't know what that means.”

“C'est ça le,” I replied, leaning up to give him a chaste kiss. The smile that he gave me afterward made my stomach flip-flop. “Mais j'aime quand même ça t'embrasser.” I added in his ear.

“You should speak French more, I think.” Eren replied. I dropped back down on my heels to observe him, finding myself far too pleased with the slight flush on his cheeks.

“I'll _consider it_ ,” I replied, and we both laughed softly. “Get back to work.” I added, swatting him gently on the arm. He pouted in response.

“Okay, okay. You gonna show?”

“Yeah, I'll see you later, slacker.”

I moved to leave, but Eren grabbed hold of my sleeve. I turned to ask what was wrong, but he bent down and gave me an awkward kiss. Our noses bumped and he laughed against my mouth, leaning back with an apologetic look. “See you.” he said, trying again to look casual as he took hold of his little book cart and wandered off towards the back of the library. I tried to push the feeling of his lips awkwardly jammed against mine out of my head, though it made my insides squirm in a way that I wasn't familiar with. Butterflies seemed so childish, not to mention cliché.

A strong breeze made me shiver, and I hurried my steps as I headed to my car. There was a distant hum of anxiety in the back of my mind at the concept of going to a bar. Being surrounded by strangers will never be on my Top 10 list of things that are enjoyable, but I was curious about the kind of band that Eren was in. We had talked extensively when he stayed over at my place, so I knew a little about who was in the band, but it struck me suddenly how little we really knew about each other.

Jumping into sex wasn't something that typically bothered me; I've had my share of meaningless fucks from meaningless men whose names I never asked for and would never bother to remember. My early twenties were more about filling a gap in my life that had shown up unannounced and without any clues on how to fix it. Maybe it was my parents, maybe it was my loneliness, maybe it was the fact that I've always been just a bit fucking weird and unmemorable, but talking those things out in therapy only seemed to morph the tiny gap into a chasm of emptiness. I tried to fill it with sex, I tried to fill it with alcohol, I tried to fill it with drugs. I always came up short and hating myself as I rode out the last blissful hours of a high, the peak leaving me craving more and unable to consider that maybe I should stop.

I didn't stop of my own accord, to be honest, so much as my body told me to fucking stop, fucking stop it right now or I was going to die. It wasn't the symptoms that bothered me. Nose bleed, pounding heart, hearing my pulse in my eardrums? That was nothing new. The chills, the cold sweat, that was strange, but puking blood in a filthy motel shower on legs that weren't going to support my weight? That was concerning. I probably wouldn't have called Hanji to pick me up, but I had an overwhelmingly strange feeling I can't describe. It was similar to anxiety, clawing at the edge of my consciousness, something whispering in my ear that this wasn't _right_.

Hanji hit 90 on the deserted streets, screeching into the ER drop-off zone and dragging me inside. I couldn't carry myself, and I spoke gibberish to the bored attendant who asked my symptoms. He seemed wholly unconcerned with what was wrong with me, taking my blood pressure (138 over 102), checking my heart rate (118 BPM). Hanji clutched my shoulders so tight I could feel the blood pounding under her fingers as I got a yellow bracelet strapped to my wrist and told to go wait in the visitor area.

I sat there for hours, Hanji sleeping on my shoulder, trying not to let the panic of being within reach of medical help and completely ignored ignite my panic. The high faded by itself, the strange feeling disappeared. I didn't vomit again, the shaking subsided. I felt entirely normal, and it was with bitterness that I realized I was going to have to find a way to afford an ER bill for the complete lack of help I had received. I told the attendants I was leaving, much to Hanji's displeasure, and she dropped me off at the motel without looking at me.

“Don't call me again until you straighten yourself out.” she had said, her voice empty, before driving away. I felt small, worthless.

It was a period of my life that I tried not to think about, but I couldn't stop the memories from drifting through my mind as I considered the fact that I was genuinely upset with myself for sucking Eren's dick before I had even bothered asking him to dinner. It made me feel dirty in a way I hadn't felt in years, shame creeping up and settling in my stomach as I pulled into my parking spot outside my apartment. I looked toward the gate, then felt an indistinct chill set on the car.

“What are you doing here?” I asked as I got out of the car and walked to the gate. Erwin looked up from his phone with a wan smile. I realized that I sounded hostile, but he was used to it with me.

“You changed your number,” he said in reply, then placed a hand on my shoulder. “Good to see you, too. You look... healthier.” he chuckled gently, dropping his hand.

“Thanks?” I unlocked the gate, checking the time as we walked quietly to my apartment. I still had plenty of time, but I was eager to shower and change.

“Am I unwelcome here?” Erwin asked, his tone so serious that I paused in unlocking my door.

“What? _No_ ,” I snapped, giving him the best glare I could muster. “I just didn't expect you to turn up on my doorstep.” I already felt flustered, as I always did around him, and I cursed the fact that he still had any effect on me at all.

“Well, I would have called...” Erwin trailed off with an apologetic smile, following me into my apartment and removing his shoes by the door. It was a habit I was glad to have instilled in him.

“Yeah, yeah. Sorry I didn't text you, I broke my old phone and didn't realize I lost your number...” I muttered, trying not to look in his direction. He was wearing his typical professor garb, which had always made me want to jump him the second he walked in the door.

Fuck.

“I'll make it brief,” Erwin walked to my couch, looking down at the blanket that was folded there with a bemused expression, and too late I realized it was the one I had stolen from his house. Rather than comment on that, he sat, folding his hands in his lap. “Your parents contacted me.”

I sank wordlessly on the couch next to him, mirroring his pose unconsciously. It hadn't quite registered, what he had said, but the cogs were turning in my head and I struggled to keep my breathing even. “Ativan, please. Medicine cabinet.” my voice was robotic, even to my ears.

Erwin stood without asking questions, going to the bathroom and returning quickly with two pills. I took them from him and swallowed them, which gave me time to realize that I had just fucked myself out of going to Eren's concert. When I had been living with Erwin, my dosage had been smaller, but he hadn't known that it changed. I sighed and rubbed the bridge of my nose. “You want to stay for dinner?” I asked.

“Does dinner involve ramen?” Erwin replied. I shook my head, drawing my legs up onto the couch.

“I have stuff to cook, but I can't cook. Shouldn't have taken both.” I replied, trying not to look too guilty.

“How much did I give you?”Erwin asked. I looked up at him, expecting to see disappointment, but he only looked concerned. I wasn't living that life anymore, and he knew that. I felt slightly proud.

“4mg. I'm sorry, I forgot... I don't take it much anymore. I'm probably going to...” I looked away, frowning. “You know. Fall asleep.”

What a way to skirt the issue.

I took my phone out, trying to think of something that I could tell Eren. It's not that I was planning on lying to him, but I had several different ways I could phrase the truth:

  1. The guy I used to be obsessively into dropped by.

  2. I took too many Ativan.

  3. A combination of the above two.

  4. I have been forced to think about my parents in the past hour.

  5. I really want to see you, but I hate bars.




If Erwin noticed my internal struggling, he didn't comment on it. Instead, he went into the kitchen to check my refrigerator and cabinets, while I struggled to compose a text that didn't make me sound fucking nuts. In the interest of not being uncomfortably honest, I sent a text informing Eren that a friend I hadn't seen in some time had stopped in. I didn't have to add unnecessary details.

I looked at the text Eren sent in response.

_Okay! Later, then?_

I remembered him asking me to just _let him know_ , and I felt like a dick at his easy acceptance that I wasn't going to show. I'd had several opportunities leading up to the Halloween party to tell him I was occupied, and yet I was just too much of a selfish fucker.

I pushed it from my mind. Water under the bridge.

 _Drop by tonight after the show_ , I replied.

“Anything worth eating?” I asked as Erwin came out of the kitchen.

“I'll order something.” Erwin replied, sitting down again with his phone. I pulled my laptop off my work station, finding the silence to be a little grating, and put on a random playlist sitting in my iTunes. I didn't really care what came on, but I needed to do something about the heavy quiet in my apartment. “How are you feeling?”

“It's been less than ten minutes,” I shrugged, hitting shuffle and putting my laptop back where it had come from. I didn't really recognize the song, but Erwin being off his phone took precedent. “What about my parents? What do they want?”

“They've been trying to find you,” Erwin started, glancing at me briefly when I inhaled sharply. “Dropping your family name appears to have worked. They came to me, hoping I could give them information.”

“And did you?”

“Do you honestly feel the need to ask?” Erwin replied, meeting my heated glare with his usual calm-friendly smile. I'd known him too long to be suckered in by it; he wasn't heartless, but he was a calculating sonofabitch. “No, I trust you.” I drew my knees up to my chest, shivering slightly. Erwin unfolded the blanket, his blanket, and wrapped it around my shoulders.

“I didn't manage to convince them that I hadn't heard from you,” he continued, his hand lingering on my shoulder. I glanced at it, then at him, and was a little confused to find him directly next to me. I had left a cushion between us on purpose, not having wanted to be tempted by his stupidly handsome face. “But I stuck to my story regardless.”

“If they come around again, tell them from me that they can fuck off.” I said, my voice far more rough than I had expected it to sound.

“You can tell them yourself, Levi,” Erwin replied sternly, removing his hand from my shoulder. I opened my mouth to retort, but he cut me off. “I already told them not to involve me, I believe they will respect that.”

I shifted where I sat, torn between wanting to know more about what my parents wanted, wanting to crawl in Erwin's lap for a form of cheap comfort, and wanting to send him away so that Eren wouldn't have to deal with my school-boy bullshit after his show.

I didn't want to want Erwin. I had no intentions of ever going down that path, the fact that he and I would never be right for each other firmly in my mind. I felt slightly disgusted with myself, having been mostly successful at pushing him from my mind in the past few months, but I was definitely feeling strong pangs of attraction and I didn't like it one bit.

“Why are they looking for me?” I asked finally.

“I know how you feel about them, but even _crotchety old fucks_ like them,” I laughed as he pulled a phrase I had used in one of my many rants. “They can have changes of heart. You're their son.”

“I think I would have rather not known,” I rubbed the bridge of my nose again, wondering what precisely I had done to deserve two trips down memory lane in one day. “But thank you for telling me.”

Dinner came and went; I was a little too out of it to really focus on what I was eating or hold a decent conversation. Erwin and I had spent our fair share of time not talking around each other, but I still felt uncomfortable picking at my food and mostly ignoring his existence. On the other hand, it couldn't be helped. I felt distinctly unfocused, floating in the middle of my apartment and more relaxed than I could ever possibly hope to achieve on my own.

It was late when Erwin got up to leave. I felt as though I had been asleep for a long time as I followed him to the door, but I was looking forward to Eren stopping by. It was possibly the only reason I had bothered staying awake, a fact that would have normally caused me to over-think my own intentions. For the time being, it was nice to just like someone, and be okay with liking them.

“Erwin.” I said, causing him to pause on the steps outside my front door and turn to look at me. I felt my body sway, and I grabbed onto the door frame for support. “Do you find me attractive?”

 _Oh god_.

I didn't have enough clarity of mind to feel embarrassed by what I had asked. Erwin was giving me an odd look, an emotion I couldn't name colored slightly by polite confusion. My cheeks burned.

“Is that relevant?” he asked. I realized I had hit a nerve, and it was so rare to hit nerves with Erwin Smith.

“No. Not anymore,” I said. The Ativan was taking me a step beyond honest, the kind of honesty I preferred not to indulge in. It was one thing to wonder if Erwin had ever fantasized about tossing me on his bed and fucking me, quite another to actually _ask him_ if he found me attractive. Erwin would see it for the veiled confession that it was. “I was just wondering.”

“You're right,” Erwin laughed, shaking his head, succeeding in looking like my antics were not a source of unease for him. “That ship has sailed. Call me if you change your mind about your parents.” he gave me a polite nod as I tried to untangle the knot in my head at his words. I realized as I watched him walk away that I had no idea if he meant because he had once been interested, or if it was because of Eren.

Except, I couldn't be entirely positive I had even mentioned Eren.

I sat down on the stairs, not paying much attention to the goose bumps on my arms or the iciness of my toes as I went over what had just happened. My mind was sluggish, weighed down with the week, my confusion, and now Erwin. As much as I liked his company, previously, I hadn't been ready for him to waltz in unannounced (though that was my fault) and wedge himself back into my thoughts.

How long I waited before Eren was at the gate, I have no idea. I got up with stiff limbs, shivering, and opened the gate to allow him in. I wobbled as I walked, a detail I apparently couldn't hide, as Eren slid an arm around my waist and helped me back inside. We were silent, comfortably so, as he walked me to my couch and sat me down. I pulled him with me and he stumbled, falling half in my lap with a grunt of laughter and scooting down to give me room to sit.

“How was the show?” I asked over the playing music, squinting at him to prevent myself from seeing double. Eren looked at me with concern, and I realized as his thumb trailed over my jaw that my lips were trembling. I was talking before I had consciously decided to do so. “I would have come but he was here when I got home. I'm sorry, after this week I...”

Eren frowned as I trailed off into nonsense, pressing his fingers over my mouth. “Trash can.” I muttered, nudging Eren away. He jumped up to grab the trash can by my workstation. There was silence but for the awful sound of retching, a dull ache creeping into my back as I bent over to vomit. I had forgotten that heavy meals with Ativan had never worked well with me.

“Are you high?” Eren asked, his voice neutral. I wiped my mouth on my sleeve, _fuck it_ , and looked up to meet his narrowed eyes.

 _Ice-age heat wave, can't complain_  
If the world's at large, why should I remain?  
Walked away to another plan  
Gonna find another place, maybe one I can stand

I nodded wordlessly, expecting him to draw away, expecting anger. Disgust. What I didn't expect was the crumpled, anxious look he gave me. I didn't expect him to sit back down, close to me, or his gentle hands on either side of my face. “What happened? Are you okay?” he asked, his face so close to mine that his breath tickled my skin.

“It was an accident,” I shook my head, bringing my hands up to cover his. “We used to live together … dosage is higher he gave me two and my parents are looking for me.”  
 _I move on to another day_

_to a whole new town with a whole new way_

_Went to the porch to have a thought_

_Got to the door and again, I couldn't stop_

I listened to the lyrics after I finished talking, my stomach twisting itself into knots as the thought that Eren was _different_ formed into my head. “I'm okay.” I whispered. I hated the way I was acting, hated that I so often found myself behaving strangely around this person that I wanted to get to know. His continued presence indicated that he didn't mind, which confused me more than it soothed me.

Eren had seen me at normal, but I had also deteriorated quickly into my worst. I had made poor decisions and dragged him along through them, apologized, and yet here I was again.

_You don't know where and you don't know when_

_But you still got your words and you got your friends_

_Walk along to another day_

_Work a little harder work another way_

_Well uh-uh baby I ain't got a plan_

_We'll float on maybe, would you understand?_

_Gonna float on maybe would you understand?_

_Well float on maybe would you understand?_

I clenched my jaw, lost in Eren's eyes as he gazed at me. “Say something.”

I don't know if I wanted him to condemn me or assure me, but not knowing what was going on in his head was suddenly maddening.

“Hey, it's okay,” Eren pulled me against him and I relaxed into his body all at once. Maybe I didn't know his favorite color or what he did when he wasn't in class, when he wasn't singing, but I knew without a doubt that Eren was _good_. He had come to accept, possibly understand my contradictions and oddities despite our short relationship. I had no idea what he expected, no ability to be sure of what I could give, but whatever we were, if we were anything, felt right.

_I like songs about drifters, books about the same_

_They both seem to make me feel a little less insane_

_Walked on off to another spot_

_I still haven't gotten anywhere that I want_

_Did I want love? Did I need to know?_

_Why does it always feel like I'm caught in an undertow?_

Eren's strong arms were tight around my waist, and I couldn't help but feel safe. “Can I stay over?” he asked me, quietly. I nodded in response, not trusting my mouth to convey what was going through my mind. My thoughts were becoming disjointed, erratic, and I could barely make sense of them to understand what I was trying to tell myself. Eren seemed content with my silence, leaning back against the armrest of my couch and holding me tightly against his chest. His voice was quiet, mingled with the soft music, and I drifted off to sleep feeling an intense comfort I hadn't felt in too long to remember.

_I know that starting over is not what life's about_

_But my thoughts were so loud I couldn't hear my mouth_

_My thoughts were so loud I couldn't hear my mouth_

_My thoughts were so loud_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Rapinii suggested I add this, since she's having trouble keeping up with the passage of time:
> 
> Tuesday: Levi sees Eren perform for the first time. Drinks all night with Hanji.  
> Wednesday: Goes over to Eren's place.  
> Thursday: Leaves Eren's in the AM. No contact again until...  
> Tuesday: Eren performs, goes back to Levi's place. They have the kisses, Levi goes "wtf no" and Eren leaves.  
> Sunday: For reasons unknown even to himself, Levi invites Eren over.  
> Monday: Eren leaves, Levi has a crap attack.  
> Tuesday/Wednesday: Still having a crap attack.  
> Thursday: Crap attack lessens, goes to Halloween party.  
> Friday: Current day in question.
> 
> So, not much time has passed. I feel like Levi, being the emotive guy I write him as, is probably more the whirlwind courtship type.


	12. I Want

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Exploring.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is really short. I think it qualifies as a drabble, but it's in the Room 23 AU, so I thought I'd post it here.
> 
> I listened to http://youtu.be/nqssURR-xpw while I wrote it. No idea why that song spawned this.

Eren's thumbs swiped gently over the shadowed skin under my eyes, his gaze intense as he drank in the details of my face. I had spent much of my life looking at the people the way he was looking at me, or so I imagined, but I had never considered how deeply uncomfortable it could feel. I considered all of the flaws I had picked out from my body over the years: my constantly shadowed eyes, my soft and decidedly feminine face, my narrow eyes, my disproportionately broad shoulders, thick neck, thick thighs. On a good day I could pretend I was a mini-Hulk in training, but most of the time I just felt like I looked like a wall.

I wasn't entirely sure how we had wound up here, in my bed. I don't remember when he climbed on top of me, when he began his exploration with mouth, fingers, eyes. I shifted underneath him, watching the warmth build in his gaze. It was strange to be looked at so passionately, like I was something worth cherishing. I knew lust, but Eren's expression was different. Gentle, and appreciative, borderline _loving_. I wanted to know what was going through his head, wanted to know what he was seeing, but I didn't want to ruin it.

I stayed silent.

“Beautiful.” Eren whispered in my ear, trailing soft kisses from my jaw, down my neck, across my collarbone. I felt my face immediately contort into my typical disdainful expression, and at the moment I was glad that Eren was focused elsewhere. It was a strange compliment, but I didn't want to ruin the mood. As I turned the word over in my head, I found I kind of liked it, anyway.

I contented myself to lie beneath Eren, closing my eyes to concentrate on the feeling of his lips against my skin. The trail of kisses and gentle bites seemed to burn as he moved further down, across my chest, down to my hipbone, across to the other. My body was reacting on its own to the sensations, shivering and twisting into his touches. “Eren...” I whispered his name between heavy breaths. He made an indistinct noise in reply, dragging his tongue over my abdomen, biting down on the skin just above the waistband of my sweatpants. I whimpered, my hips unconsciously rising, trying to find friction for the hard-on I was trying to ignore. I had only just come to the conclusion that our relationship needed to be less about our dicks, and I resolutely pushed myself back down into the mattress.

Eren sat up, straddling my hips and looking down at me. I watched as his eyes followed the paths his fingers traced over my chest, back under my jaw and up to my hair. Our eyes met for the second time, the possessiveness in Eren's gaze surprising me. I had seen that look before, the one that threatened far more complication than a coke hit was worth. It was different coming from Eren, tinted with gentleness. “Eren.” I said his name again, just to test the feeling of it on my tongue.

“Levi,” Eren replied, his voice rough, thick with emotion. When I didn't respond, Eren resumed feeling out the dips and swells in my body, running his hands up my arms. I was confused when he lifted himself off me, but he gently re-situated me so that I was lying on my stomach. I felt the first hint of nervousness then, but Eren leaned down to kiss the nape of my neck and I pushed it from my mind. “Levi...” he breathed my name into my skin. I felt my stomach tighten, heard my intake of breath at the way my name fell from his lips.

I shivered at the feeling of Eren's breath fanning over the back of my neck. I closed my eyes, resolving to just _feel_. His fingertips ran down the back of my arm, our fingers intertwining as he nuzzled the long hair that fell behind my ear. The fabric of his shirt rustled as he moved, trailing his fingers back up my arm and over my shoulder, tracing the outline of the black wing tattooed on my back. A soft whine escaped my lips before I could stop it, my body arching into his touch.

The world seemed to blur at the edges as I lost myself, only aware of Eren's touch, his body on top of mine, his voice murmuring sweet nothings against my skin. His fingers were light against my back, barely there, causing me to quiver and gasp involuntarily. An odd tremble went from my stomach through my torso, my limbs, as each touch drew out another heavy breath, a quiet moan. “Perfect,” Eren murmured. He licked softly up my spine, eliciting a choked moan, my toes curling.

Eren laughed, quietly. “You're so perfect.” he repeated. I felt my cheeks heat up, unable to stop the compliment from going straight to my head. Eren slid off of me, drawing me against him, our legs tangled together under the blanket.

I fought the urge to argue again. I had spent most of my life picking myself apart, looking for reasons to feed the negative self-perception that my depression relished in, and for once I wanted to just listen. I wanted to believe that Eren really thought what he was saying was true, that he was able to look at me and see something appealing enough to actually refer to it as _perfect_.

Eren's mouth was still pressed against me, soft kisses at the nape of my neck that made me writhe. I was so warm with him pressed against me, no expectation for what was going to happen next, no pretense to obscure what we both wanted.

 _Wanting_ , now that was an interesting one. Much of what I wanted in life was shallow. I lacked the interest to have a five-year plan, forgetting about all points after B and treating life as a point-to-point journey. Harvard was perhaps the most future planning I had ever done in my life, and while I certainly wasn't at the _wanting a future_ stage with Eren, there were definitely things that seemed worth chasing after.

At the moment, I wanted nothing more than to spend the next several hours, days, weeks entwined with the man holding me, no concern for the outside world. I wanted to learn as much about him as he had learned about me, wanted to see a little into his head. I knew he had only shown me so much, but whether or not that was intentional or not, I couldn't yet figure out.

I was in far deeper than I realized, because that was the definition of wanting at least a little bit of a future.

“Levi?” Eren asked. I felt him settle his head behind mine, breath causing the hair against my ear to flutter.

“Hm?” I replied, rolling backwards into him. The feeling of intimacy between us had changed; I had been laid bare before him, an act that he seemed to understand fully. I imagined it was the same way he had felt when I had painted him. The role reversal was strange, but I was the closest to feeling comfortable in my own skin that I had felt in a long time. “What is it?” I nudged Eren with my shoulder, but he didn't respond.

I turned slightly to look at him. His eyes were closed, mouth hanging open as his breath evened out. It was still late, 3:15 according to my alarm clock, and I realized that Eren really had laid awake with me. To make sure I was okay, to be there if I had needed him? I couldn't say for sure, but my heart sped up and I shrank a little next to him. To be cared for was something that I pushed off, and thoroughly. Hanji was the only person who had remained constant in my life. I probably could have counted Erwin, but I always firmly decided not to.

Eren, though. I couldn't push him away, not really. I observed him as he slept, his innocent face completely devoid of emotion. He looked peaceful.

I wondered if I looked the same when I slept.


	13. Your Chariot Awaits

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hesitation, cider, letting go.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Um. Hello.
> 
> I'm posting this without beta because ... I can. I fixed things, but if I didn't fix all the things, I'm sorry and feel free to let me know.
> 
> Song: http://youtu.be/gUvrrpvyQaU
> 
> Thanks for reading.

I was surprised to wake up after Eren. It was a weird moment of deja vu, because I definitely smelled breakfast cooking, and I definitely heard him singing to himself. It baffled me how the little shit could be so chipper right when he woke up.

I stretched with a long sigh, wincing as my calf muscles locked and twitched. It was one of those post-bad decision things that I was no longer used to, and I reached down to massage my calves back into a normal state of not-pain before trying to descend the ladder. Finding myself with a broken ass and having to work a Saturday afternoon shift wasn't my idea of a good day.

“Morning!” Eren said cheerfully as I padded into the kitchen, not turning to face me. The smell of onions and garlic made my stomach grumble insistently; I hadn't had much in the way of food the previous night.

“Hey.” I replied. He was only dressed in his jeans, his shoulder muscles flexing as he stirred whatever concoction he was attending to. I closed the distance between us, wrapping my arms around his waist and nuzzling between his shoulder blades.

He tensed.

“What are you making?” I left a flurry of kisses against his back as I moved to peek around him into the pan. It was a simple mess of roughly chopped vegetables, but I spotted mushrooms. “I think I may love you.”

“Wh-what?” Eren spluttered, looking down at me in alarm. I looked back at him silently until he gave a short laugh that seemed forced. “It's the mushrooms, right? I took you for a mushroom kind of guy.”

“I can't go giving you all my weaknesses at once,” I shrugged, going over to the fridge for eggs. I was pleased that there were still enough left to make a good burrito. “No bacon?”

“Aren't you a vegetarian?” Eren replied. He sat the wooden spatula he held on the side of the pan, turning to look at me. I pretended not to notice when he leaned casually against the stove, wincing and jerking away from it when his backside was scalded by the hot metal.

“I ate bacon the last time you made it.” I placed the egg carton on the counter, leaning against the sink rather than the currently heated stove.

“Yeah, but you didn't eat any meat on Halloween, which was kinda obvious since like everything was meat.” Eren pointed out. I felt my brows raise at the observation as I cracked eggs into a bowl.

I suddenly felt very bland and domestic. Putting it that way makes me sound like an ass, but I was extremely content to stand there, assembling and then eating breakfast hurriedly, spending the rest of the free hours of my day wrapped up together on the couch. I didn't feel the need to talk, and it didn't seem Eren did either. I don't remember which god awful sitcom we sat through until I had to insist that no, I really needed to shower for work. I only remember that Eren's laugh was loud and carefree and it made me feel weightless.

The weekend came and went. I suffered through two shifts at Room 23, trying to appreciate the fact that Sasha had been hired. I could be petty and say that Hanji was a shitty manager, but the truth of the matter was that her boss was shittier. There was never a such thing has having an adequate amount of staffing; no matter how quickly the usual afternoon crew could make a decaf extra shot soy latte with cream and get a patron out the door, it wasn't enough to give us breathing room.

The service industry and I have never gotten along, and I was at the end of my rope with it as November began displaying more overt signs of winter. Sasha had begun showing up late — not late enough for anyone to really give a shit, but late enough that I noticed. She had begun an awkward sort-of romance with Eren's roommate, Connie. Awkward because I couldn't tell if they were aware they were into each other or not, but they both had it pretty bad. My interactions with Connie were limited, but he seemed like an alright kid.

I wasn't sure how it had happened, but it was suddenly the Tuesday before Thanksgiving. I hadn't counted the time that had passed since the first time I had been comfortable letting Eren sleep in my bed; I only knew that I had completed all but three papers for the semester, I was becoming slowly reliant on caffeine (as you do around midterms), and Eren had basically moved into my apartment.

My internal brakes would have usually been completely against this. I hadn't checked, but I was fairly sure that romantic comedies were only fiction. Wacky circumstances leading up to fairytale romances have never been, will never be real. Yet, here I was, fixing lunch as quickly as I could while Eren napped on my couch. His keyboard was set up next to my work station, paper scattered over my desk, the floor, a busted pen slowly oozing gelatinous ink across the wooden floor. I glared at the mess as I exited the kitchen with a bowl of pasta I was pretty sure was going to go bad within the next ten minutes, mentally re-arranging my schedule to allow time to clean up after the brat.

The pen, though, I couldn't let that one go. Exasperated, I sat my lunch down, picking up the pen carefully and cleaning the mess as thoroughly as I could. I darted out the door, Eren still snoring as I locked up, and barely made it to class on time.

I had no complaints. Far too many times, we had woken up together, Eren lamenting the fact that he hadn't thought to bring a change of clothes and cautiously sniffing his socks. It was kind of disgusting, really, especially when his nose would wrinkle. That usually meant he'd worn the same pair of socks twice.

I wasn't working the Tuesday before Thanksgiving, so it felt bizarre to sit at a table by myself and sip a Christmas. I never remembered the name of that particular drink, only that it was a nice blend of chocolate and peppermint that we only served around the holidays, and calling it a Christmas was easier than remembering which order we needed to say the words peppermint, happy, mocha, yummy, latte. Not quite as good as peppermint tea, but my preferred drink was dying a silent death at Room 23. One that I tried not to think about. I would have to quit the day I walked in and couldn't get a regular black tea.

I secretly hoped that day would be soon.

Eren caught my gaze as he set up his keyboard, giving me a rather sheepish smile before averting his eyes. He had been odd, lately. While we had progressed, he was reserved, hesitant. I couldn't put my finger on what was going on in his head, only that I wasn't entirely sure why our relationship was progressing at all. I liked Eren far too much, that much was clear, and I knew that I was becoming far too attached. It was too nice to wake up with his arms around me, to be fed breakfast and dinner and eat leftovers for lunch, to come home to the sound of him writing a new song every day. He discarded far more than he kept, but each melody he created was indescribably beautiful.

The idea that we'd both been in this same building a month ago was equally strange, as though from a life that I had never quite lived. I sat up straighter when I remembered that I had pulled Eren into Hanji's office, drunk on cheap liquor and the the feel of his body against mine. It had all been so out of character, and I realized now, looking at Eren prepare the stage, that Eren himself had probably realized that as well. I couldn't say for sure — I've always been good at reading situations, reading people — but I was _almost_ sure that the hesitation I felt from him was perhaps more from understanding how much he didn't know.

“Not working?” Eren asked, sauntering over to my table and sitting down. His hand was covering mine, warm, soft. I shook my head, avoiding his gaze.

“I heard there's a pretty good show here on Tuesdays, though.” I said through a faint smile. Eren laughed in response, squeezing my fingers. It was the first time that I had come in of my own volition, and it was strange how many people were beginning to cram themselves into the little shop to hear him play. I spotted Sasha and Connie chattering by the counter, Mikasa sitting with Armin in the front row, and Reiner, Annie, and Bertl brushing snow from their coats as they entered with a gust of cold wind. Annie gave us a polite nod as she passed, Reiner clapping Eren on the shoulder once as he babbled to his lovers about the '69 Chevelle that had come into his shop that day. I think Bertl stumbled through a greeting, but it was lost under Reiner's booming voice, and he looked away from us as a dull redness stained his cheeks.

“I should probably get to it.” Eren said, giving me a soft smile. He looked uncharacteristically nervous. I turned my hand in his to give him an encouraging squeeze, frowning slightly as he looked away.

“Eren.” I said; he looked back at me, reminding me of a scolded puppy. This wasn't the time to say anything, and I didn't know what I could even say.

I made a soft sound of surprise as Eren leaned forward and planted his lips on mine. Automatically, I stiffened, aware that we were in the center of a large crowd of people (and _my workplace_ ). My desire to pull Eren close and push all that I felt into him with lips and hands was quickly pushing down my sense, my hands traveling to his face and pulling him closer. There was fire in my chest, and he was parting my lips with his tongue, hunger evident in the way he —

“Break it up, kids.” Hanji poked me hard on the shoulder, and we broke apart. Eren laughed, and I admired the way his lips were dark and red from the pressure of my own mouth against his. He was looking at me with mischief, and I was suddenly aware that it had been several days since we had shared any kind of physical intimacy. Since the Halloween party, we had given up on sex in favor of conversation. It seemed like a mutual decision, as Eren had pushed nothing. Was it intentional? Was he just waiting for me to make a decision? I couldn't be sure, but I appreciated it nonetheless.

Eren got up, heading over to the stage without a backward glance. “Been a while since I saw you,” Hanji said, placing her hand on my hair. I looked up at her; she looked tired and a good 10 years older, but there was an indiscriminate happiness about her face that I wasn't used to seeing. “Been a while since I was here on a Tuesday night, actually.”

“Sit.” I said simply, but Hanji shook her head.

“I'm working tonight. Professor canceled class, I could use the money, you know how it is.” Hanji shrugged in response, ruffling my hair before she too sauntered away.

Life has a weird way of catching up on you all at once, and I was realizing that between my near-vacancy in Hanji's life and my pseudo-domestic contentedness with Eren. I had forgotten what steps I had taken to get where I was, wasn't sure which steps to take next or where I even wanted to go. Confusion isn't a strong enough word, I was more lost than anything else, but without the blatant warning signs that were usually in place to keep one from driving off a cliff.

I closed my eyes, sighing. How could I say I was contented at all? I hadn't been in such a precarious position in a long time. I had willfully given over power to someone else.

“ _Qu'est-ce qui m'arrive_?” I asked myself out loud, chewing on my lower lip. When I opened my eyes again, Mikasa was approaching my table. Armin trailed behind her, looking slightly wary, and I could tell by Mikasa's pointed stare and her sure footsteps that there was a definite goal in mind. I had no doubt in my mind that it probably had something to do with Eren, or his abrupt disappearance from the commune. “Hey, Mikasa. Armin.” I greeted, looking back at Mikasa with the best impression of polite confusion I could muster.

“Hi Levi.” Armin replied. Mikasa merely inclined her head, sitting next to me and placing her latte down next to my Christmas. Armin pulled his chair out to face the stage, opting to hold his coffee rather than place it on the table.

“So,” Mikasa started at the same time Eren started speaking into the mic. I wanted to listen to him, but I also knew it was in my best interest to hear Mikasa out. Eren had spoken of her often; she was protective, she was physical, and she was fearless. I didn't think it would come to blows at any point, but I didn't want to find myself in the situation. I hated fighting, everything about it. “Marco's parents have a cabin in the mountains that we go to every winter. Kind of a house tradition. You're coming, right?”

“Marco's parents again?” I cocked my head to the side. “I'm going to find out Marco has no parents and you're all in organized crime, aren't I?”

Armin laughed, but Mikasa's expression barely changed. I could swear she looked less predatory for a moment, though. “All the more reason for you to comply with our demands.” she said loftily.

“Eren hasn't mentioned anything to me.” I replied honestly, reaching for my cup. It was still warm between my fingers, which tended to be unnaturally cold.

“Of course he hasn't,” Mikasa rolled her eyes. “But you're coming.” she added, and I couldn't help but notice that I didn't have much choice in the matter. Figuring now was the best time to make a good impression, I nodded.

“Sure, as long as it's after finals.” I agreed. Mikasa glanced at me sideways, then gave a nod of her own.

“Of course,” Armin cut in. “I don't think anyone would be willing to go if it cut into the end of semester madness.”

“And we've got to make sure our resident nerds don't fall victim to end of semester hopelessness.” Mikasa teased, reaching out to ruffle Armin's hair. He gave her a playful glare, flattening it back against his forehead.

“What are you majoring in, Armin?” I asked, curious.

“Engineering.” Armin gave a half-shrug, fiddling with his cup.

“He's going to destroy the world with nanotechnology.” Mikasa whispered loudly, causing Armin to laugh.

“Now that my secret has been given away...” he scooted next to me as Jean and Marco hurried over, grabbing chairs.

“Hey, guys!” Marco said brightly, waving as he sat.

“Oh look, it's Eren's kidnapper.” Jean eyed me with one brow cocked, but sat down as the first notes of piano filled the shop.

I focused on Eren, who was looking at his hands. The song he was playing seemed familiar, at least a little. He had played the melody the first time I had invited him over however many weeks previous.

_And so it seems_

_That if sleep makes dreams_

_Then sleeplessness makes us_

_That's fine_

_Melatonin and wine_

I settled back, taking a sip of my drink as Eren played. His eyes traveled the crowd — there were far too many people stuffed into Room 23, and they were here to see him. Our eyes met and he looked away quickly, and I had the strange feeling again that something was _off_. I couldn't say what, but Eren was definitely skittish.

_We got too close_

_Way too quickly_

_To hopefulness to which we are both hopelessly addicted_

_I'd say the tree still needs another bell_

_Judgment, don't fail me now_

I sat my cup down, trying not to fidget too much. Mikasa was looking at me intently, and I saw Armin glance at me in my peripheral vision. I wondered if there was something they knew that I didn't, or if they were merely guessing. It seemed obvious at that point, at least to me, what Eren was singing about. It explained his tension around me. It explained my feeling that something was off.

Eren's voice faded, the piano picking up quickly into a chaotic melody that I tried my hardest to focus on, but it was lost to me as I turned over the lyrics in my head. I couldn't be sure what it meant, really; to put someone on paper was not necessarily a very personal thing for me. I had sketched strangers on my breaks, doodled their faces and poses as quickly as my hand would allow.

But, I had only ever painted two people in a fashion I would consider intimate. It hadn't meant to be overly personal with Eren, or... had it? I wasn't sure. My intentions at the time weren't the subject of my thoughts. I just knew that I liked the way Eren looked, and I wanted to paint him. However, my process didn't quite translate to Eren's.

_It's getting in my dreams_

_It's gotten in my dreams_

_It's getting in my dreams_

I didn't get it, but I felt small and on display with the way Armin kept glancing at me. What was he looking for, anyway? A reaction, something to give him his “ah-ha” moment that it really was about our relationship? I felt my fingers moving over their own accord, picking at a loose thread in my sleeve.

_And everything is always worse, babe_

_At 4:30 in the morning_

_Black bird has died_

_Red bird is on the rise_

_Guess this is why_

_I've always both loved_

_and hated_

_The sick gray light of the dawn_

I took a long breath in through my mouth, exhaling through my nose. Eren's voice continued somewhere in the background, covered by a vague buzz that my mind tended to conjure when I was feeling particularly neurotic. At least Armin had taken to looking at the stage and nothing else, at least Jean and Marco were either clueless or too oblivious to realize or maybe I was completely wrong because honestly, he had been so occupied lately and —

I forced myself to take another deep breath. Anxiety works in weird ways sometimes, where it creeps up on you before you even really understand why it should be there in the first place, before you're consciously aware that something is wrong and for a minute you can be left wondering what the actual hell is going on.

_It's getting in my dreams_

_It's a bad shade of green_

_But I don't care what they say_

_My dreams might say about me_

My fingers continued to pick at the thread in my sleeve, until I felt the thread running over my arm underneath, felt it give and come out of my sweater. With more effort than it should have taken, I looked at Eren. I wasn't surprised to find him focused on his hands, but he glanced up at me as though he felt that I was looking at him.

_I need, I need something beautiful to carry_

_And you're all I care about, babe_

_You're all I care about, babe_

How had this even happened? I held Eren's gaze; my feet felt heavy against the wooden floor, my fight or flight instinct pulling itself in two directions in the back of my head.

It was all so fucking ridiculous. I could let the kid move into my apartment, but the second one of us put our feelings into _words_ , the anxiety comes.

No. I clenched my jaw, actively thinking to pull my fingers away from my sleeve, taking hold of my drink instead. No, I wasn't going to do that, I wasn't going to give into anxiety. Not this time.

_Your hand is your wand_

_And your landscape is drawn_

_And your chariot awaits_

I was so desperately convinced.

* * *

“S'matter?” Eren's tired voice broke the otherwise silent night. He was standing in front of the ladder that led to my loft, oversized sweater hanging down over his too-short sweatpants, hair in disarray.

“Eh.” I shrugged, getting up to join him. As far as I was concerned, I had done an exceptional job at not acting like I was bothered by anything.

“Right,” Eren nodded slowly. “You're absolutely right.”

“You sound like Petra.” I grumbled, trying to step around him to climb the ladder. In response, Eren casually placed his arm across the ladder, looking at me pointedly.

“Do you want to talk about it?”

“I think you do.” I shrugged, trying to plan my best escape route. With my ladder blocked, I could possibly curl up in the bathtub until danger passed, or perhaps run out of the apartment _à_ la cat.

“Is that a no?” Eren pushed. I tried to read his expression, but it was very determinedly blank.

“Yes.” I answered simply. Eren dropped his arm from the ladder, frowning.

“Is there anything I need to do?” he asked. I couldn't tell if it was concern or annoyance in his voice, but at least he hadn't turned and walked out. That was good.

“No,” his eyebrow raised. “I don't know. I'm fine, I could just use some sleep.”

“Alright,” Eren agreed, still watching me with that peculiar expression. I mentally shrugged it off, starting to ascend the ladder. I jumped when I felt Eren's fingertips brush up my thigh to the curve of my ass, and looked down to fix him with a glare. “What?” he asked innocently.

“Tch,” I opted to roll my eyes before crawling onto my mattress. Eren followed me shortly after, laying on his back and looking at the ceiling. “I'm not going to freak out. I'm just not good at feelings.”

“ _Really_.” Eren asked with an air of surprise. He turned to look at me, brown locks of hair falling against his face. He opened his mouth to say something else, but cut off abruptly with a half-frown.

“What?”

“What are you doing for Thanksgiving?”

I could tell this hadn't been what he had intended to say, but I wasn't about to complain. Even though I had been alone in the coffee shop, I had jumped a slew of _feelings_ hurdles. It didn't feel fair to give Eren a half-assed explanation because I was too tired, or because I hadn't allowed myself to think about it properly.

“Nothing, probably. What about you?”

“Mmmmm,” Eren rolled onto his side, curling his knees slightly to his chest. His eyes were wide, and he looked deceptively boyish. “Dinner with the house. Dessert with my dad.”

There was something strange about the way Eren had said the last bit. Though I knew that he and his father had become practical strangers after his mother's death, I didn't know much else. I figured Eren didn't like talking about it, so I had never pressed. “Kind of a yearly tradition, you know.” he added.

“Sounds fun,” I shrugged, sheets rustling under my shoulders. “Bring me a plate of leftovers. I can put aside my vegetarianism for good turkey and gravy.”

“You are the worst kind of vegetarian,” Eren rolled his eyes, his expression one of utmost ennui. Seeing that expression on someone other than myself was weird. “How about you come, instead? Everyone in the house cooks something, so we have a lot of food.”

“Everyone? So... that's what, 9 dishes? Christ.”

“It will be 10 if you come.” Eren grinned at me.

“You know I don't cook.” I grumbled, turning over slightly so that I was facing Eren. Our knees bumped, and he immediately wove his legs around mine.

“You kind of do,” he replied thoughtfully. “You make really good scrambled eggs.”

“Yes, I can see it now. The turkey forgotten, mashed potatoes thrown out, Mikasa and Annie fighting over the last traces of scrambled egg. My cooking will become legendary.”

Eren snorted loudly, giggling immediately and covering his mouth. “So you're coming, then?”

“Eh, sure,” I cringed internally at the thought of being in that cramped dining room with Eren's friends, but I was surprised to find I was actually sort of looking forward to it. “Why not?”

* * *

Like most things that I push into the recesses of my mind, the entire _song ordeal_ was forgotten by the time Hanji and I were sitting in Eren's living room. The entire house smelled amazing, and the apple cider I was sipping didn't do much for my viciously grumbling stomach.

I glanced sideways at Hanji, who had been sleeping on the couch for nearly the entire visit. I didn't mind that the two of us were off to the side while the residents of the house busied themselves in the kitchen. Being out of the way of the kitchen chaos was preferable; the day had descended into friendly bickering as it neared 4 PM. Watching people rotate in and out of the kitchen was like watching battle. 

Most of the house had their own way of getting what they needed. Annie and Mikasa were silent glares, while Jean and Eren were loud and obnoxious. No one would chance being difficult when Marco was involved, and Connie was great to have in the kitchen due to his sense of humor. I felt bad for Bertl, though. He had been working on desserts for most of the morning — he had been pushed aside and juggled by everyone cooking so frequently that I was amazed by both his patience and his ability to get anything done.

Getting anything done, well, that was mostly thanks to Annie. She was a woman of few words, I had been able to surmise during our brief interactions, but she had a way of commanding attention. “If you want dessert,” she said, pushing between Jean and Eren, who were both tending to the gravy on the stove. They had a system where Jean would whisk and Eren would add sifted flour, but it had started far more arguments than could possibly even be necessary on Jean's whisking technique or Eren's flour sifting prowess. “You're going to have to let Bertholdt in the kitchen!”

With that, she grabbed a wooden spoon and slapped Jean and Eren in one smooth motion across the shoulders. They both yelped and flattened themselves against the stove. Bertl squeezed between them and the refrigerator, back to his neat arrangement of baking ingredients.

“Hanjiiiii,” I whined, shaking her shoulder. “Stop sleeping.”

“You mean pretending to sleep.” Hanji grumbled, trying to bury her face even further in the soft pillows on the couch. I was pleasantly surprised by the cleanliness of the house; Marco had informed us that keeping up on chores was worth not having Mikasa or Annie breathing down their necks. I wondered briefly how Eren could be so damn messy with Mikasa for a sister, but that was a question for another day.

“Gravy's done,” Eren flopped on the couch beside me, squinting as the last rays of daylight hit him across the eyes. “We really need a curtain for that window.” he added.

“Food is ready?” Hanji perked up immediately, but I couldn't help but notice the dark circles under her eyes. They looked strange on her; somehow, between her podcasts and managing the shop, she had always found a way to be bright, chipper, mostly annoying. Seeing her so visibly exhausted was unnerving. I would have to talk to her later.

“Ready-ish. Reiner isn't back from work yet.” Armin cut in, sitting on the arm of the couch. He looked alarmingly tired as well, and I was starting to worry that maybe I was slacking off somewhere. I caught Eren's eye and scowled, to which he responded with a poke to my cheek.

“He's late,” Annie chimed in. She stood next to Armin with her arms folded across her chest, texting with one hand. “He was supposed to be back by one so he could get a nap in.”

“Where does Reiner work?” Hanji asked, frowning slightly. “Making someone work on Thanksgiving, that's shitty.”

“He took over his dad's body shop a few years ago,” Annie replied, sliding her phone in her pocket. “He likes to stay open a bit on holidays because it's good money.”

“I bet,” I rolled my eyes, imagining the amount of out-of-town celebrants that must come through, the drunk college kids, and all manner of terrible driving in the Boston area in general. “How old is he?”

“Um,” Annie paused, glancing sideways in a manner that told me she genuinely had to think about it. “23.”

“How do you forget that?” Eren asked incredulously.

“You two are only a year apart.” Armin shook his head, but he was smiling.

“It gets confusing,” Annie protested. “I remember that one of them is a year older, but you'd think it would be the one that doesn't act like he's still in high school.”

“Heard that!” Reiner's voice came from the hallway. A cold burst of air came with him as he came into the living room, wearing blue coveralls that were blotchy with dirt and stains. I eyed the blackened pair of gloves sticking out of his pocket as he stopped to give Annie a hug.

“Great timing, we were just talking about you.” Annie grumbled, but she gave him a quick kiss and a half-smile that seemed completely out of place on her face.

“Bertl still in the kitchen?”

“Yes, and you're not joining him until you've _had a shower_.”

“I washed my hands.” Reiner shrugged, disappearing into the kitchen, followed closely by Annie. I hoped she had enough good sense to smack him with her spoon before he got touchy-feely with the food.

“All three of them?” Hanji asked, as quietly as I'm sure Hanji was capable of asking anything. I shot her a warning glare, not wanting to send Bertl into a meltdown if he overheard us gossiping like little girls about his sex life. Hanji, though, she never really paid attention to my silent cues. Not my verbal ones, either.

Maybe telling her about the whole threesome thing had been a bad idea.

“Uh... yeah?” Eren looked bewildered for a minute, then laughed. “Sorry, we're so used to it by now...”

“How did that happen?” Hanji asked eagerly. I groaned.

“Hanji, can you at least wait until they're not in the next room?” I hissed.

“I dunno, it just happened,” Eren shrugged, glancing toward the kitchen. “You'd have to ask them for details, Annie moved into their room the same day she moved into the house.”

“Hmm!” Hanji got up almost immediately. I imagined she was going to ask them just that, and I wasn't at all interested in the kind of reactions she would get. With any luck, she would have the good sense to ask Reiner. I could see Bertl going into a silent panic and Annie glaring Hanji out of the house, possibly the city. That wasn't really how I wanted to spend my Thanksgiving.

“I've been snacking all day,” Eren sighed, making up for the spare room Hanji had left on the couch by leaning into me, his head in the crook of my neck and shoulder. I made an indistinct noise, not really sure what I was supposed to say. “I'm not even hungry now.” he added.

“Aw,” I leaned my head against his. “You poor thing.”

“I know.”

Dinner, which I expected to be chaotic and only moderately enjoyable, turned out to be the highlight of my Thanksgiving break. I suppose with years of experience feeding themselves, or maybe just with the advent of cooking blogs, the house had managed to put together a meal that I regretted I would only have once a year at best. Well, unless Eren and I crashed and burned. I was still half expecting it.

I digress. The only thing more surprising than the main event was that Bertholdt had put together a chocolate pie that Jean and Eren literally fought over before Mikasa took the last piece while no one was looking.

After dinner was less interesting; Connie had the foresight to brew a pot of strong coffee, and Eren and I had grabbed mugs before going up to his room.

“I’ve got to get going,” Eren said quietly. It had been nearly an hour since dinner, and we hadn't done much more than lounge around lazily. I was balanced carefully on his windowsill, watching the movement of cars in the distance until Eren had spoken. His brows formed nearly perfect straight lines over his eyes, a slight crease between them; one corner of his mouth was tilted down, as though he couldn’t decide to frown or not. “I can meet you at your apartment?”

“Going where?” I replied. I hadn’t confronted what I was feeling, not really. The normalcy of my day was — well, not unwelcome, but  _unnerving_. I wasn’t in the mood for unnerving.

Eren’s eyebrows twitched downwards, before returning to their straight lines. “Dessert.” was all he said in reply. _Oh_ , _right_. I looked back out the window. The darkness outside had descended into a feeling, seeping in through the cracks of the windows. Eren’s good mood had vanished, but he seemed intent on acting casual. As though I didn’t know him well enough.

“Why don’t we both go?” I suggested.

“Mikasa should go.” Eren muttered darkly. “Maybe things would be more… normal if she would be a _decent_ daughter.”

It was the first time I’d heard Eren speak of Mikasa in a way other than positive, but the emphasis he put on the word ‘decent’ was harsh, undeniably angry. I got down from the window to sit on the corner of his bed, placing my hand on his knee. He covered my fingers with his own immediately. The tension in his face relaxed just slightly. “I’m sorry.” he whispered.

Eren swallowed, hard, his Adam’s apple bobbing in his throat. I had no clue what he was apologizing for, so I stayed silent while he glared at his hand over mine. I wasn’t much use when it came to familial things — or life things in general — but Eren seemed satisfied just with my presence.

“It’s okay to want things to be normal.” I said quietly, rubbing my thumb along the edge of his palm.

“I know it is,” Eren replied. “It's just — Mikasa hasn’t spoken to our father in years. It probably wouldn’t make a real difference, though. He’s not any different now than he was before all of this,” he took in a ragged breath, paused, then shook his head. “It's not her fault.”

“Why doesn't she visit?”

“She's … I think she's too chicken shit to face him. They had a fight and she said he wasn't her real dad or something stupid.”

“Harsh,” I blinked at the information, trying to fit an outburst like that into the small portrait I had of Mikasa in her mind. Well, grief had made people do stranger things. “Why don't you talk to her about it?”

“She never feels like talking about it,” Eren was scowling again, but I could see that he was determined not to get angry. It was a strange glint in his eye that I had noticed, red creeping into his ears as he would force himself to look at nothing and chew his lower lip. He had never lashed out, but I wondered what exactly he was holding down when his anger would flit momentarily behind his eyes. “I can't make her.”

“Implying you've tried?” I asked. Eren looked away, confirming my suspicion. “She cares about you a lot. If she knew how much it bothers you, maybe she would listen.”

“Yeah, maybe,” Eren shrugged again, still avoiding my eyes. “Look, about the song...”

“Is that really important right now?”

“It's important to me,” Eren replied stubbornly. “Why does it bother you?”

“It doesn't _bother_ me,” I sighed, leaning back against the headboard. Eren's skeptical expression was well deserved, but my unconscious mind had pretty much come to terms with things. Pretty much. “I was just surprised. You made a few confessions, you know.”

“I'm aware,” Eren agreed, but he still looked skeptical. For the amount of masking I had done in my life, I was annoyed that it didn't work with Eren. “So which part was it that bothered you?”

“I said it didn't bother me,” I grumbled, causing Eren to laugh. He knew it did, even if I wouldn't admit it. “Things happened really fast.”

“That's true,” Eren nodded. “It's not really about you, though. It's about me.”

“I'm not _that_ arrogant,” I snorted, pushing on Eren's shoulder. “It would have made a terrible love song.”

Eren laughed again, but the sound was more reserved. Maybe he had been just as bothered by it as I had. Maybe behind his easy smile and sparkling eyes he was having just as difficult a time with me as I was with him. He had a way with words that was beyond me, but I liked that about him. Solvable puzzles were boring.

We didn't say anything else on the topic. I wasn't sure if my answer had satisfied or frustrated him, but he talked animatedly while he drove across town to his dad's. The house was less impressive than the one he was living in now, but a good house for a small family. The smell of apple cider hit me as soon as we walked in, Eren introducing me as his boyfriend and Grisha shaking my hand. We ate pumpkin pie together in the small kitchen; Eren mostly talked about his studies while his father listened, his hands folded on the table. Eren didn't look much like him; they both had dark hair, but Grisha's face was narrow and angular, his eyes a standard brown color.

Their conversation was quiet and murmured, short sentences punctuated with long silence. I felt Eren trying to draw me in, but I could see at the same time that Grisha was tired. The kind of tired that a few good nights of rest won't fix, the kind that festers deep inside. I knew that feeling all too well, and it was difficult to sit between Eren and his father. Their conversation had faded in my ears, replaced with a dull monotone that I tried my hardest to push from my mind.

Grisha excused himself early, walking down the hall with heavy and deliberate footsteps that sounded forlorn in the quiet house. I wasn't sure what to make of the situation; he seemed both caring and apathetic, with an awkwardness that was palpable. It had lingered behind in the kitchen; I was fairly sure it would take a miracle to diffuse it. The smell of pumpkin pie and apple cider should have been one that made a space feel like home, but the emptiness in the house had settled in the pit of my stomach, gnawing gleefully away at the contented feelings that Eren and I should have been sharing.

“It's been like this ever since...” Eren drained his mug in one long drink, a trickle of cider seeping from the corner of his mouth and down his chin. He wiped it away with his sweater, looking toward the battered old slow cooker that the cider was still warming in. “Being here is like being in the past. Nothing about the house has changed since she died. Mikasa and I were already moved out and starting college when it happened, so I think he felt like his role as a father had reached its end. When mom died, he lost being a husband, too.”

I sipped my cider quietly, my face warm despite the chilly atmosphere. I didn't know what to say, so I stayed silent while Eren leaned back in his chair. We had both lost our parents at the same stage in our lives, but my exit from family life had been a decision rather than a circumstance. I frowned at that.

I looked up from my cup, meeting Eren's gaze. The crease between his brows and the slight frown he wore made him look much older than 21, made my chest ache for whatever it was he must be feeling. What he had felt for years. “He cares about us,” Eren insisted, lowering his gaze back to his mug. I glanced at his hand, curled on the table, trembling slightly. If I couldn't give him words, I could give him contact; I reached over and laid my hand over his. He turned it palm up automatically, our fingers intertwining. The shaking extended into my own arm. “But he's given up. There's nothing that I can do about it.”

“Not everyone can come back from something like that,” I said. Eren's eyes flicked in my direction before settling back on the table. “But I don't think you're right,” I continued, cautiously. “He's still trying. You're always able to come back, aren't you? Maybe dessert and short conversations aren't enough to erase what's happened, but I don't think someone who's given up would bother at this point.”

Silence stretched between us. I worried that maybe I'd crossed a line, or said the wrong thing, but Eren didn't pull his hand away from mine. The crease between his brows deepened as he considered my words, then gave a barely perceptible nod.

The wooden chair Eren sat in scraped against the floor as he stood, pushing it back under the table. He busied himself with rinsing our mugs. I stood as well, expecting that Eren would want to leave, but he remained in place by the sink. His back was unnaturally straight as he looked out the window. “Give me a minute,” Eren said as I moved to take a step toward him. He traced his father's footsteps, going to the doorway that led to the rest of the house. “You can follow if you want.”

We walked quietly down the hall to a closed door, which Eren unlocked with a key around his neck. I hadn't noticed it throughout the night, despite the fact that the black cord around his neck was clearly visible just above the collar of his shirt. The key was an old-fashioned brass one, faintly discolored and dirty. I had no idea why the door was locked, but I was hesitant to bring it up once we descended bare wooden steps into the basement.

Pink-shaded lamps flickered on as I followed Eren, casting a rosy glow around the basement. The space was clearly Eren's mother's. A day bed stood against the far wall, beneath two small windows that had curtains closed over them. Adjacent to the day bed was an old writing desk. Papers were still strewn across its surface, but they were discolored and I knew that nothing in this room had been moved from its place since Carla had died.

Eren's soft “Hi, mom” caused me to look up. He was sitting on a red velvet stool that looked as ancient as the writing desk, his elbows resting on a Singer sewing table. Like everything else in the room, it was distinctly vintage; it had a wrought iron treadle and detailing, the dark wood chipped and scratched. An unfinished bunch of material was gathered off to one side, a faded pink fabric with polka dots and strawberries. I wondered if it had been something for Mikasa, who seemed to have an affinity for cute things despite her aloof exterior.

There were other things around the room, pieces that matched the descriptions Eren had given me. A red glass apple held down the papers on the desk. A planner that had “lunch with the kids” penciled in for December 19th sat on top of a stack of graded papers that were held together with brightly colored paper clips. A dress form that had a finished frock coat on it made me smile; I knew that it had been for Eren, who had admitted with a shy grin that he had done some “nerdy stuff” to try to impress a girl years back. From the costume, I gathered that it must have been some sort of Renaissance fair stuff.

Hopefully not LARPing.

My attention was caught by a small array of frames on the corner of the desk. I walked closer to look at them, smiling slightly at a picture of Eren as a chubby, bright eyed baby lying on his back with his feet in his fat hands. Each picture seemed to be of Mikasa or Eren or both, save for a family picture with matching sweaters that everyone but Carla looked entirely too bitter about wearing. Eren bore a striking resemblance to her; they had the same gentle smile, large eyes, soft face. I wondered how many personality traits they shared, and laughed softly when I remembered that Eren had described her temper as “legendary.”

I walked behind Eren, wrapping my arms around his shoulders. He leaned back into me, not bothering to hide the tears that fell down his face. “Ahoy, matey.” I murmured as I kissed his forehead, relieved to see that he cracked a grin.

“I've never brought anyone here before.” Eren's voice was tiny, barely audible even in the heavy silence. His tears subsided, and he tilted his head back to look at me wordlessly. His eyes were tinged red, contrasting starkly with the green and making them seem unnaturally bright in the dim light.

Quietly, Eren turned around on the stool and took my hands. He barely had to look up at me, a fact that still disgusted me a little. “Look, Levi...” he started, raking a hand through his hair. It was already mussed from the many times he had done so throughout the evening, and it was sticking out at odd places.

“What is it?” I asked. My own voice sounded far too loud by comparison, but I pushed the thought from my mind. Eren looked serious, more serious than I'd seen him yet. I reached out to place my hands on his shoulders, and he brushed his hands against mine before letting them fall back to his lap.

“I...” he trailed off, seeming to lose his resolve, before he shook his head.

I stood there pretty uselessly, looking around the room while Eren regained his composure. After he cleared his throat, I felt like it was probably safe to look back at him. The tear tracks down his face still shone faintly, his lashes dark around his eyes.

“What?” I urged him again, gently, reaching up to swipe my thumb across his cheek. He leaned into my touch just faintly.

“Nothing,” he laughed, shaking his head again. “I just really like you, is all.”

I paused, cocking my head. “Funnily enough, I was able to figure that out on my own.”

“Ass.” Eren grumbled, but he stood and pulled me into a tight hug. I wrapped my arms around his waist, standing there for I don't know how long in the musty smelling basement. Eren's shoulders shook at one point, his grip on me painfully tight, but I wasn't able to bring myself to push him off even as my discomfort tried to shout down reason.

As we left the house, Eren paused on the creaky front porch. Our breath misted in the air as he looked around the front yard. “Thanks for staying through all of that.”

“You don't need to thank me,” I shrugged. The gravity of being the only one allowed to be in the basement with him wasn't lost on me. “Besides, I really like you too.”

Eren grinned, but his expression was somber again quickly. “You know, I come back here every year,” he leaned against the railing, looking off into the distance. It was a rather dramatic pose, but now wasn't the time to point that out. I kind of wanted to paint it, though. “It never gets easier to see the room. I don't know why I do it to myself.”

“Why go back, then?” I asked curiously. I couldn't really understand his reasoning, or his feelings. I suppose Carla must have been a very different mother than my own.

“I don't know. So I don't forget? I don't want to forget.”

“Eren, you won't forget,” I frowned, reaching forward to take his hand. It was still trembling slightly. “Maybe it's time for you to let go.”

Eren looked at me, silently, for a long time. I wasn't sure if it was seconds or minutes that passed. His expression was unchanging, eyes narrowed as he thought about what I'd said. “Yeah,” he nodded finally, looking back at the door. “Yeah. It is.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope this was acceptable. I was pretty nervous about posting it but it's already been forever and a day so yeah.
> 
> Thanks for the comments and stuff, sorry I don't reply in a consistent fashion. I'm a flesh container of anxiety and social awkwardness, but I really appreciate all the comments and kudos. If you've stuck with me to this point you're awesome. >_>


	14. Heavy is As Heavy Does

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sex, shots, and shows.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I haven't updated in a while, blah blah mental health blah breakups blah.
> 
> Thanks Rapinii for beta-chan and encouraging me to write and being a cool bro.
> 
> I finished planning this story, so hopefully I'll have fewer issues continuing. A solid plot helps.
> 
> This chapter's music: http://grooveshark.com/#!/s/Heavy+Is+As+Heavy+Does/4Vn2Iz?src=5

“Oh my god,” Eren flopped down next to me on the couch, holding the package of cookies I'd brought home from work close to his chest. I looked up from my painting at the sound of the rattling, pushing my glasses up my nose and giving Eren a faint glare. “You are the best boyfriend.”

“I know it.” I replied shortly. He didn't say anything at my attitude, only reached out to ruffle my hair. We were both in need of good haircuts; my bangs had grown long enough to cover all but the tip of my nose, which had me sporting a tiny ponytail as of late. On the other hand, Eren's hair was nearing his jaw, and I was slightly amazed after living with him for weeks (it was months, but I wasn't ready to confront that yet) just how quickly the kid grew hair. While I could go a couple days without needing to think about shaving, I was pretty sure there were days that Eren shaved twice.

“What's in these?” Eren asked around a mouthful of cookie. I gave him a withering look, scooting over slightly to avoid any manner of crumb that might spray out of his mouth.

“Pear and ginger,” I replied, sighing when Eren slid closer to me and wrapped his arm around my waist. “What?”

“You're moody today,” he teased, leaning over to nuzzle my neck. I shivered automatically, but tried my best to hide it. “Are you mad that I left the dishes out overnight?”

“Um,  _yes_ ,” I snapped, pushing on his face. He giggled, taking my hand in his free one and placing kisses across my knuckles. “You get free room and board, you could at least clean up after yourself.” I grumbled.

“I offered to help pay rent,” Eren protested. “I offered last —”

“You can't afford to help pay rent for two different places,” I cut him off, turning my attention back to my painting. Eren was silent, which was unusual to say the least. “I wouldn't ask you to leave your friends out to dry, but you might as well just put your name on my lease.”

“What, really?” Eren asked. His voice had changed completely — less light and carefree, and entirely too surprised for me to feel comfortable. Was it really that odd of a request?

“Unless you don't want to.”

“I didn't say I don't want to.”

There were several moments of silence, interrupted only by the sound of Eren scarfing down the cookies in his lap. I had noticed that he tended to need something to do with his hands when he was deep in thought, and I pulled the package of cookies away from him before he could finish them off. “Your whale has a growth on it.” he commented, sounding a little punch drunk. I resisted the urge to reply sarcastically; I was working on a whale that had mountains on its back, so obviously? But I had tried to be less short with Eren, even if I wasn't good at it. Even if he didn't care what I threw at him.

“It's supposed to, idiot.” I yawned, leaning back into Eren's open arms. Oh well, I  _tried_.

My eyes wandered to the front door, where our luggage was sitting, ready for the drive we would be taking the next day. The end of the semester had brought with it the usual: less stress, more sleep, and more shifts at the shop. Hanji had been kind enough to give me the week off, which was saying a lot as she and Sasha were both coming along. I figured if Sasha was coming, she and Connie might be an official thing, but I wasn't sure why Hanji was so eager to come along. She had invited herself before I had even finished mentioning that I was going out of town.

I would have argued, but after achieving a 4.0 for her first semester, I felt like she deserved it.

I exhaled slowly at the feeling of Eren's fingers along my shoulder, massaging in deep circles. “I'll think about it.” he said quietly, his hand moving down to my bicep. I looked around after I felt him place a gentle kiss on top of my head.

“Don't think too long, I might rescind my offer.” I said seriously.

“Of course you will.” Eren replied. He leaned his forehead against mine, eyes falling closed.

“Stop being all cuddly,” I pushed Eren away by the shoulders, fixing him with my politest glare. “We have to leave for your show soon.”

“What does that have to do with me cuddling you  _now_?” Eren protested immediately, pushing forward with his shoulders until I fell backward. He landed on top of me at an awkward angle as the brush I was holding clattered to the floor. No doubt it splattered paint everywhere.

Eren's lips were on mine before I had a chance to huff at him. I made a soft noise that was something between exasperation and surprise, feeling Eren smile in response. I could smell the sweet mix of pear and ginger on his breath, taste it on his lips. He pulled back for breath, his grin wide. “Brat.” I muttered, pulling him back down. His eyelashes fluttered as his eyes fell closed, our mouths brushing tentatively.

“Levi,” Eren whispered, still so close that I could feel his lips moving as he spoke. He hesitated, drawing back. “I want you.” he mumbled awkwardly, averting his gaze. I bit down on my tongue to keep from laughing in response.

“Okay.” I responded when I was sure that I wouldn't giggle. Eren's eyes darted back to my face, more blue than green thanks to the redness of his cheeks.

“Okay?” he asked. “That's it? Okay?” he breathed a laugh.

“I mean, oh  _yes_ ,  _do me_  you  _magnificent stallion_.” I shot back, leaning up to kiss him before he said anything snarky in return. We tended to get stuck in sarcasm loops, but I had other things in mind.

Eren returned the kiss eagerly, pushing me back down so that I was propped on the arm of the couch. He settled between my legs, pushing them open a little more forcefully than he probably intended. I gasped in surprise, and Eren took the opportunity to thrust his tongue into my mouth. It wasn't unusual for him to come on strongly, but his hands fumbling to pull my shirt over my head, the taste of him in my mouth, and the weight of his body on top of mine all at once was making me feel lightheaded.  
We broke apart once to pull my shirt off my arms and throw it somewhere in the general direction of the hamper. Eren's shirt followed suit, not quite as well-aimed, before Eren dipped his head to kiss the corner of my mouth. I groaned in protest, tilting my head to try to capture his lips with my own, but Eren held me down by the shoulder while he unbuttoned my jeans with one hand. “ _Jesus_.” he whispered as he managed to shove my jeans and boxers down with a rather violent jerk.

“It's Levi.” I corrected before I could stop myself. Eren tore his eyes away from my body, looking at me incredulously.

“You have a problem.” he said very seriously.

“What sort of—” I took in a sharp breath as Eren wrapped his hand around my dick. “Problem?”

“You can't shut up.” Eren replied easily. My breathing was shallow, my pulse quickening, and here he was carrying on a conversation. Of course he would.

“Shut up.” I breathed, reaching down to rid Eren of his remaining clothing. He laughed, quietly, but it ended in a grunt as I rubbed my thumb over the head of his cock.

There was silence but for the sound of our panting and moaning. Eren rolled his hips against me slowly, letting out a long breath. “Jesus fucking Christ.” he said in a low growl as he gave a few shallow thrusts that pressed his cock against mine. I agreed with a long moan at the friction, closing my eyes tight to concentrate on the feeling of Eren jerking both of us off.

“If you don't stop I'm going to—” I panted, my hips moving in time with his rhythm. “If you —  _aaah,_ ” I whined, my hips jerking. “Stop, stop.”

“Coming is the point,” Eren responded, his voice deep and rough, but he slowed his motions. I whined again, trying to compensate by pushing my cock hard against his hand. “Are you sure you want me to stop?”

“No,” I snapped, pulling him down by the back of his head with my free hand. Our lips met, his hair falling against my cheekbones, both of us breathing harshly through our noses. “Don't you dare stop.” I growled, giving up on trying to control myself. I scratched at his back, trying to pull him closer, until he was bent over me with him forearm bumping my inner thigh on every stroke. “ _Eren_.” I would have normally been embarrassed by the loud plea in my voice, the broken sound of it, but Eren responded with my name in the same voice that told me we were both rapidly coming undone.

I cried out indignantly when Eren stopped, sitting up hurriedly and grabbing his backpack. “What are you doing?” I asked, leaning up on my elbows in time to see him pull a bottle of lube from the front pocket.

“I'm going to fuck you.” Eren replied, pushing me back down with one hand on my chest. Our eyes met, and after a moment I realized that Eren was waiting for my agreement. I nodded, and that was all it took for him to unscrew the cap and messily pour some of the liquid on his fingers. I  _tsk_ ed when I saw it leak from his fingers and drop onto the couch, but Eren wasn't having any of that. He pushed one of my legs back, giving my cock a few firm strokes before moving down.

I gasped as Eren pushed one finger in. I could tell by the somewhat wild gleam in his eyes that this was just a nicety at the moment, so I opted to stay in my place and relax as much as possible. I've never gotten why people say “just relax” in this situation, because to be honest being assfucked is a little bizarre and uncomfortable no matter what. “You good?” Eren asked. I nodded.

“Keep going.” I assented, unable to help squirming a little. I squeezed my eyes closed when he added a second finger. Having been celibate for the past couple years didn't make getting ready for the good old in-out much easier; I dug my nails into the side of the couch as Eren worked his fingers down to the knuckle, trying to block out the sounds of discomfort I was making. “More.” I added quietly, hissing when Eren obliged me.

“Is it good?” Eren asked, his voice a little softer than it had been.

“Yeah,” I nodded, my eyes burning slightly. Eren slid his fingers out, then pressed them back in. I had noticed his pianist fingers long before they had been inside me, but I hadn't realized just how deep he would be able to push. I squeezed my eyes closed. “I'm ready,” A pause. “And don't ask me if I'm sure, just fuck me already.”

Eren laughed, withdrawing his fingers. I felt his weight shift on the couch, felt his thighs under mine. He lifted my hips and pulled me toward him, leaning over and resting his hands on either side of my shoulders. I could feel his cock pressing gently against my entrance. “Eren—” I started, but whatever I had planned on saying was lost as Eren pushed inside of me in one motion. I couldn't help letting out a loud cry, part pain but mostly pleasure. Exactly how I liked it.

I could already feel my fingers digging into the strong muscles of Eren's back, hear the sharp cries I made every time Eren thrust into me. It was a little unreal to be intimate again, but I found that the anxiety I had expected to be there was nonexistent. I watched Eren's face, contorted with concentration as he worked out a pace. I could tell he was holding back, but I knew that he wouldn't be able to keep that up for long.

“ _Shit_.” Eren panted, using one hand to push his hair out of his face. He growled and leaned over to press a fervent kiss against my lips, nipping at my bottom lip before breaking away to catch his breath.

“I thought you were going to fuck me.” I challenged before I lost my nerve.

Eren responded by sitting back on his heels, pulling me with him by my hips. The position forced his cock deeper inside, causing me to whimper pathetically. It was slightly uncomfortable, with my back arched high off the couch, but my mind was a haze of pleasure. “Oh, god,” I moaned, Eren grunting once in response. His fingers were tight enough on my hips to leave bruises, which only added to the overwhelming haze. I was practically vibrating, my dick throbbing for release. “Ah,  _fuck_!” I yelled it, throwing my head back,

“Touch yourself, I want you to come.” Eren panted. His pace was becoming erratic, but the raw power he was using to fuck me more than made up for it.

“Yeah,” I said, not really knowing why, but immediately moving my hand to my dick to resume jerking off. I could feel the orgasm building in the pit of my stomach, my entire body tensed with anticipation. “Oh  _god_ ,” I repeated, taking in a ragged breath. “Fuck, Eren,  _fuck me_!”

“Fucking—” Eren growled, the sound of flesh slapping together drowning out whatever he said after. I jerked my hips down, hard, and came with a strangled cry. My hand dropped and I felt my legs giving out, but Eren held me tight against him as he continued pounding away, swearing every few seconds. I whined at the ferocity of his thrusts, still riding out the post-orgasm waves. Eren's clenched his fingers around my hips and came with a gasp that ended with a guttural moan.

Thankfully, Eren had the good sense to sprawl backwards rather than on top of me, his chest heaving as he tried to catch his breath. My legs, mercifully on the couch rather than supporting half my weight, trembled slightly. I closed my eyes, my own breathing returning to normal as feeling spread back into my limbs. “Ow.” I muttered, stretching my legs. Eren swatted at my foot when I accidentally tickled his side, but otherwise didn't move.

“Get in the shower.” he nudged me with his foot.

“You get in the shower.” I retorted, nudging him back. He swatted at my foot again.

“Why don't we both get in the shower?” he asked.

“This did not occur to me,” I said, sitting up. “That's not a bad idea.”

\- - - - -

Somehow, Eren and I managed to make it to his place with time to spare. There was an obvious bounce in Eren's step that had me laughing silently the entire car ride over, which left him baffled and questioning my sanity.

“Hey guys!” Hanji's voice greeted us as we closed the front door to the house behind us. She launched herself at me, hugging me tightly. I patted her shoulder and pulled away, just as a loud crash and even louder swearing made the three of us jump. Jean came racing down the stairs after his suitcase, which had burst open as it fell down to the landing, and was scrambling to re-pack everything as quickly as he could.

“Hey Jean.” Eren said in greeting, bending down to help fold up some sweaters and toss them in Jean's suitcase. Jean looked up, clearly bewildered; I had to stifle more laughter at Eren's sudden compassion towards his mortal enemy.

“About time you got here.” Jean replied without any venom in his voice. Hearing the stairs creak, Jean turned, practically dashing back up them to take Marco's suitcase from him.

“I can get it, Jean!” Marco protested brightly, but Jean waved him off and put their suitcases in the currently unused living room. It was full of luggage and polyamory incarnate. Reiner had his suitcase open while Annie went over a checklist of items, Bertl sitting off to the side and looking dejectedly out the window. I frowned at the expression on his face; I didn't know him, but he seemed like a nice guy. The empathy I felt was a little foreign, but not unwelcome.

“Hey,” I wandered into the living room. The three of them looked up in unison; Annie blinked and returned to her list, Bertl mumbled something unintelligible, and Reiner gave a friendly wave. “How's it going?” I asked, flopping down next to Bertl. He looked slightly alarmed by my presence.

“Good,” he cleared his throat, eyes darting to the hallway, then back to me. “Trying to psyche myself up for the show, actually.”

“Have a shot.” Annie said without looking up; she crossed a few lines off her list, then folded it up and stuck it in her pocket, apparently satisfied. I noticed that in the few seconds he hadn’t been rifling around the contents of his suitcase, Reiner had put his hand on Annie’s knee, surreptitiously rubbing the inside of her leg with his thumb. Bertl glanced at them, opened his mouth to speak, then closed it again with a glance at me.

“Yeahhhh, shots!” Eren called from the hallway. I caught Jean looking sulky, glaring daggers at Eren's back as Eren disappeared toward the kitchen.

“No shots!” Jean snapped. “We're playing a show tonight!”

“That's why yes shots!” Reiner called excitedly, jumping up to head into the kitchen as well. I trailed behind him, noticing that Annie had to tug Bertl’s hand a few times before he consented to move.

“I fucking hate you guys.” Jean grumbled, but joined everyone into the cramped kitchen. Eren and Reiner were already at work in the kitchen; Reiner was lining up shot glasses while Eren messily poured tequila in them.

“Cuervo?” I scoffed at the bottle in Eren's hand, my nose wrinkling. I could smell it from the doorway.

“Well excuse us,” Eren scoffed right back, shoving a shot in my hand. “Next time I'll bring out the 1942 for you, but tonight you get Cuervo.”

Someone laughed uncertainly as we all crammed in, toasted, and downed our shots. Bertl silently held out his glass for more tequila, which Eren refilled a little too eagerly. I didn't want to mention how supremely bad of an idea it seemed to me that the entire band was going on stage with a shot of tequila in their systems, but then again we were all in college and, who the hell gets tipsy off one shot anyway?

Unfortunately, that would be me.

“Aww, I forgot how cute you are when you drink.” Hanji stated some 45 minutes later. I was in a secluded booth with her, off to the side of the stage, while some terrible band that I had no interest in played. We were both sipping margaritas and munching on garlic fries while we waited.

“I'm always cute,” I protested, digging out a handful of fries. Looking scandalized, Hanji scooted the plate away from me. “You ready for the trip tomorrow?”

“I haven't packed yet,” Hanji replied. No surprise there. “I still have to do laundry, actually.” Again, no surprise.

“Just bring clean clothes... please?”

“God, Levi, I wasn't raised in a barn.” Hanji rolled her eyes, trying to hide her grin.

“Yes you were,  _you literally were_!” I corrected her. Her parents owned an old barn that had been converted into a house; it had been hell to visit in the summer. Hanji was a little beyond an unexpected surprise for her parents, so they'd had to build an entire extra room themselves to have a place to put her. The drawback of that was that it had no air conditioning.

Hanji just cackled, tossing a handful of fries in her mouth. A few bits fell on her shirt, which would have bothered me immensely any other time. “I heard from a little bird that Sasha is bringing along some, ah, smokables,” Hanji said offhandedly, looking excited. I raised a brow at her. “I can't wait to remind her that I'm her boss.”

“Oh, wow,” I rolled my eyes, shoving her in the shoulder. “If she cries, you're fired.”

“You can't fire me, Levi,” Hanji snorted. “It's all in good fun.”

“Yeah, all in good fun. Fucking with employees is how I get my jollies, too.” I said sarcastically. Then I paused.

“Well, yeah,  _I know_. I work with you, remember?” Hanji apparently hadn't picked up on my sarcasm. Then again, it really was true.

I felt a twinge of excitement as The 104th took the stage. There was a lot of cheering, a lot of people. I hadn't realized that they were known in the area, and Hanji apparently hadn't felt it necessary to warn me. I caught Eren scanning the crowd; when our eyes met, he gave an enthusiastic wave that had people craning their necks. I sank down in the booth a little, but returned the wave half-heartedly.

“You’re blushing!” Hanji exclaimed, far too loudly for my comfort.

“I don’t blush.” I protested, sinking even further in my seat. While she wasn’t looking, I finished off the last of the fries, trying to avoid looking too pleased with myself. The last thing I needed was Hanji making guesses about what had me in such a good mood.

“Come on, let's go dance!” Hanji jumped up, bumping the table with her butt and sending both our drinks dangerously close to sideways.

“Hanji, literally no one is dancing.”

“Come on.” she grabbed hold of my hand, tugging me out of the booth and pushing her way toward the front of the stage. I had to hand it to her, she was good at parting a crowd. I gave my best glares to people who seemed on the verge of picking a fight, and I'd like to think it was the terrifying scowl I concocted that prevented them from doing so.

We stopped at the security barrier before the stage. I had been trying to keep my attention off of Eren for the time being; I wanted to enjoy the show and Hanji's company without being that boyfriend that was all lovesick and pathetic when left alone. I was used to Eren looking a little lost when he performed solo, but he seemed more at east standing behind Jean, who I wouldn't have expected to have much in the way of stage presence.

The music began, loud and rough and somehow so utterly  _them_. I smiled in spite of myself, my eyes darting around to watch them play. True to her word, Hanji was dancing next to me, her arms waving around while she shouted and giggled. I gave her a look, which she exaggeratedly returned, as Jean started singing.

Even if I would never admit it to Eren, Jean was probably the more talented singer, and much more interesting to watch. Reiner was, unsurprisingly, an animated and overly enthusiastic drummer, the complete opposite of focused and calm Annie. Bertl didn't seem very concerned with the crowd; he moved with the music, his eyes glued to his fingers as he played.

Several beers and a lot of erratic dancing later, Hanji was slouched against the gate, watching the show intently. I watched as Annie placed her guitar on its stand, moving to her keyboard, and began to play without preamble. I noticed that Eren was looking a little too intently at her as she played, but her expression was stoic as it ever was.

_Heavy are the branches_

_Hanging from my fucked up family tree_

_And heavy was my father_

_A stoic man of pride and privacy_

My insides seemed to freeze momentarily. Funny thing, somehow even the mere mention that parents are a thing that exist could sometimes be enough to give me a full-blown panic attack. I frowned at that; my parents had never mistreated me, not really. Eren had been vague about Annie’s home life, but it had become rather obvious over time that it wasn’t a happy one.

_And I don’t care much for wishful thinking_

_It’s heavy as I breathe_

_Because I don’t believe in second chances_

_It’s heavy as I leave_

Hanji straightened up, looking back at me. I could tell with a single glance that she was considering saying something. She liked to do that when I least wanted her to, especially on topics that would send me into days’ worth of anxiety and depression.

“Finish my beer.” she said, handing me her plastic cup. I raised a brow, but took it.

“I hope you know I am not coming over at 4 AM to do your laundry for you.” I said, lifting Hanji from the fence to let her lean on me.

“I can just buy some new clothes on my way out of town.” Hanji waved her hand dismissively.

“You’re supposed to wash new clothes  _before you wear them_!” I half-yelled, feeling repulsed by the thought of slipping on a pair of pants someone else had worn.

“Shit.” Hanji laughed, leaning her head on mine.

_As prideful as a man he was_

_Proud my father never was of me_

“I talked to Erwin, you know.”

I nearly shoved her off. I stood up straight, my head whipping automatically in her direction.

“Really? Did you? You guys talk?” I couldn’t help but notice that my voice was dripping venom.

“Every couple of days.” Hanji replied, looking unperturbed.

_I did it for survival_

_But I looked like the asshole anyway_

“Yeah? And what did he say?” I demanded. Hanji took her time, combing her hair out of her face with her fingers, adjusting her glasses.

_Among six billion people_

_I want the ones who never wanted me_

“That he’s concerned about you.” Hanji didn’t elaborate, and I didn’t ask her to. We were both silent, looking at the stage.

_I’m not one for religion_

_But I can’t seem to ditch this imagery_

“So he mentioned my parents, I take it, and you were suddenly reminded by…?” I feigned confusion, which caused Hanji to slap the back of my head.

“Yes, and he mentioned visiting you…” Hanji chuckled awkwardly.

“Ugh.” I didn’t know quite what to say, but we were beginning to have to shout over the sound of the music. Eager to avoid talking about any of that, I looked back at the stage. The song had started out slow, but could currently be defined more as “chaos” than “actual music.” Hanji let me contemplate, leaning back on the security fence and looking up with interest at Annie. I followed Hanji’s gaze, surprised to see tears shining on Annie’s cheeks.

_And I don’t care much for wishful thinking_

_It’s heavy as I breathe_

_Because I don’t believe in second chances_

_It’s heavy as I leave_

_And I don’t care much for wishful thinking_

_I can’t breathe_

The song quieted, bass and drums cutting off at once, followed by Eren and Jean’s guitars, until only keyboard remained. Annie was looking down, her hair covering her face.

_Heavy are the branches_

The piano died out, and Jean was talking into the mic while Eren stepped over to Annie, patting her on the back. She didn’t look at him or turn her head, but I saw her lips moving and Eren give her a slight nod.

“You took that well,” Hanji commented as the crowd began to disperse. We stayed in our places, hanging on the fence. “Normally when parent stuff comes up, you go batshit.”

“I do not go  _batshit_ ,” I snapped, all too aware that my glare was more of a pout. “I don’t want to talk about my parents.”

“You just want to make thinly veiled confessions to Erwin that you want to bone him,” Hanji shook her head. I sucked in a breath and looked up at the stage, relieved to see Eren paying us precisely zero attention as the band packed up. Like he would have even heard us over the noise. “Don’t get mad,” Hanji threw an arm around my shoulder. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said that.”

“I don’t want to bone Erwin.” I heaved Hanji more tightly over my shoulder, walking her back to our booth.

“Oh yeah? What about Eren, then?” Hanji leered, slumping back against the red cushion. When I didn’t say anything, her expression lit up like a god damned Christmas tree. “You got laid!” she cried excitedly, lifting up her hand in an obvious attempt to score a high-five. I groaned.

“Finally!” Eren sat down next to me, kicking his feet up next to Hanji and stretching his arms over his head.

“What do you mean,  _finally_?” Hanji asked seriously. I nearly choked on my own spit.

“Putting instruments away is a pain. I’m so glad Reiner has a truck.” Eren answered cheerfully, pulling me against him with one arm. Hanji waggled her eyebrows.

We were joined shortly after by Eren’s rag-tag team of misfits, who were chattering excitedly about going off to some bar. I noticed that Annie’s eyes were red, and that Bertl was rubbing circles on her back, but I looked quickly away. It felt uncomfortable, honestly, like I was seeing a part of her that no one else was meant to see.

“Wanna go?” Eren was asking me. I blinked. “Pizza and beer, it’ll be fun.”

“We can’t,” Hanji interjected. “Levi was kind enough to offer to help me pack,” she said brightly, and before I could do more than stare indignantly, she continued. “So we’ll catch up with you in the morning!”

“Okay,” Eren grinned, planting a kiss on my temple and sliding out of the booth. “Later, you guys!”

I sighed as farewells were said; I could have argued, actually, but I knew better. I just knew better than to bother arguing with Hanji.

“I hate you so much.”

“Nah,” Hanji disagreed immediately. “You love me.”


End file.
